


The Dinosaur Detective

by DisaLanglois



Series: Raptors in the Rainforest [4]
Category: Jurassic Park Original Trilogy (Movies), Jurassic Park Series - Michael Crichton, Jurassic World - Fandom, Jurassic World Trilogy (Movies), Stealth Agatha Christie tribute
Genre: Alien intelligence, Animal Intelligence, Binary civilization, Cops, Detectives, Dinosaurs, InGen | International Genetics Incorporated (Jurassic Park), Murder Mystery, Needs More Dinosaurs!, Other, Police Procedural, Velociraptors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-26
Updated: 2019-08-16
Packaged: 2020-07-19 19:42:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 27,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19979467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DisaLanglois/pseuds/DisaLanglois
Summary: It has been ten years since the Jurassic World Incident, and eight years since the Inter-Species Mutual Aid Treaty was signed.  Two intelligent species now share the Earth, and are finding ways to live together, and most importantly,notkill each other.But velociraptors arepeople,with all the messy reality this implies.  With great intelligence come great opportunities to screw everything up.And in a city full of velociraptors, there has been a murder...(Trigger warning is for something that happened off-screen, years before the story.)





	1. The Final Problem

**Author's Note:**

> Parts 1 to 3 tell the whole story of how the velociraptors escaped from Jurassic Park twenty years ago, and set up their own hidden society in the rainforest, and how Owen and Blue together found them after Jurassic World. Earth is now a planet with a binary civilization. Oh _boy,_ it was so much fun to write! 
> 
> And I don't want to put my toys away yet, I want to write some more, so here we are.

Let me tell you about one of my earliest memories…

When I was very small, I fell down a deep hole.

I had toddled away from my brothers and sisters that day. I was very small, and also fearless in the way of the very small. I remember finding the hole, dark and deep, and staring into it, wondering how far down it went. 

I don’t remember how I fell in. But I do remember **_falling._** I remember dropping with a shriek, weightless, scrabbling desperately to catch myself. And I remember **_stopping_** , on a painful chunk of broken wood. It hurt! I clawed at the wood in my chest, and realized that I was stuck.

I twisted my head up to see the dot of sunlight above me, blinking through the sand falling into my eyes. So far!

There was no way I was going to be able to climb all that way. And nobody would ever find me here. I was deep underground, buried alive. I would never be found! I was going to die down here! 

I screamed, and screamed, and screamed. 

But adults are smarter than the very-small, and my mother had noticed me missing almost immediately. She came looking for me, and heard me screaming. The next thing I remember was her face, suddenly blocking out the sunlight at the top of the hole.

“There you are! Silly boy! What are you doing down there? We will have to come down and get you!” 

Obviously, the _really_ difficult part came next. I had fallen down a forgotten well, and it was very narrow. It was too narrow for anyone to climb down to me, so they had to dig me out. And _that_ took all day. 

I didn’t know it then, but the whole village was up there, digging in turns, hour after hour in the hot sun. My parents stayed up there all day too, keeping me calm, reassuring me that everything was going to be all right, telling me to be brave.

I remember clinging to the broken wood, and staring up at the light. I remember watching the shadows of the men coming closer and closer, digging their way down to me, carefully enlarging the hole as they went ... until at last a strong man reached his arm down the pipe and got me. 

I still remember his warm hand as he wrapped his fingers around me and pulled me to safety. Bleeding, frightened, but safe.

I have never forgotten that day.

It has left me with three things. Firstly, I still have a jagged scar across my breastbone, where the broken plank broke my fall. Secondly, I still have a fear of being trapped. i hate closed spaces.

And lastly, I believe in protecting the very small. When I was very small, I needed rescue – and now it is my turn to rescue others. I am the digger now. I find the lost, and I protect the very-small.

I _have_ done my duty, I think. 

OK, this is stupid! I'm telling my story backwards! I should introduce myself _first,_ and _then_ tell my story, and _then_ you'll understand. Let me start again! Highlight - Backspace ... no, wait.

I _promised_ you I would delete nothing. All right, then I will delete nothing. Just ignore everything I just wrote above this line. I'm sure you can do that for an old friend.

* * *

Hello, dear reader. My name is ScarBreast. I am the world’s first dinosaur detective. 

And no matter what happens to me tomorrow, this is the story of my last case: the case of Missing Three-Seven-Two, and a murder, and a theft. 


	2. Chapter 2

Night fell hours ago over the City of Eternal Spring, and I was running alone. 

At this time of night, the streets on the hills around the city were quiet, although the City’s heart still buzzed. 

At this time of night, many houses were already dark. People were preparing for bed. The rain on the tar smelled like oil and burning wire, and the street lights glittered off millions of watery diamonds.

I raced through the dark streets, unseen, running through the streets. No human eye marked my passage. No-one saw me, no-one heard me. I had run straight up from the river. 

I reached my destination, and paused, panting from my run. I turned my head this way and that, sniffing the air for threats. Nothing was out of place. I scented nothing strange up or down the street.

I had not been seen, so I leaped silently over the garden wall. 

The yard was concrete. I crossed it, my claws barely tapping. I slipped through the passageway aroung the side of the house, and into the back yard. It was pitch dark back here, but a Real Person can see well in the dark. I slid under the clothing-drying cords, letting them stroke my long back and tail. I stepped around the plastic chairs without bumping them, and around the old tin bathtub. I could smell the drains, and the chip of old green soap at the bottom of the bathtub. 

At the back of the house was a door, and I paused there, listening. Light glowed through the glass and steel bars. My breath steamed on the glass – it was cold. I could smell fried food; beans and pork. 

All was innocent inside. I could hear human voices, singing back and forth. Normal voices, normal song. They knew nothing; they were at peace. 

I closed my talons, long and black, around the door-handle. Gently I turned the handle, and pushed the door open with the tip of my snout. 

The light and smells and sounds washed over me, crashing into my eyes. I shoved the door open with my neck. Human faces turned to meet me. 

A second later I heard a shrill human cry. 

_**Papa’s home!** _

A second later, LittleOrchid was jumping to meet me. I leaned over her, and she wrapped her arms around my face in a tight squeeze. 

I snarled at her lovingly, bumping my snout against her, and felt her breath on my face. I closed my nictitating membranes and breathed in her scent. So sweet – scents of cinnamon, and shampoo, and strawberry lip-gloss. 

_My child,_ I thought, _my child._

<Happy night, my child,> I said to her. I had to pull away so that she could read my talons, speaking Human Sign. 

She had been sitting at the table, with her books in front of her, finishing her homework. She went back to her chair. 

I stepped into the food-room, my tail curled behind me. There isn’t enough space in this small room for all of me to turn at once, so I must be wary of my tail. I edged carefully around the table. 

<My darling child!> I signed. <Did you finish your learning work?>

<Yes, Papa.> She wriggled back into her chair. <I'm reading.>

<Clever girl.>

<Why are you panting?> LittleOrchid asked. 

<I went for a swim,> I replied. 

<In the rain?> LittleOrchid asked. 

<No. In the river.>

_Papaaaa!_

LittleOrchid is growing up so fast! She may be only eleven, but already she has mastered the teenage eye-roll. 

Oh, I take _such_ delight in bringing forth that eye-roll! I bumped my nose against her shoulder. 

Her aunt, SisterOfOrchids, was at the water-source, busily scrubbing the food implements, and studiously ignoring me. She pointed a soapy knife at LittleOrchid. 

_Don’t-you-roll-your-eyes-young lady!_ SisterOfOrchids warned LittleOrchid. 

_No-Tia._ LittleOrchid sighed. 

_Your-face-will-get-stuck-like-that!_

I watched the interplay, happily. This was home. This was _family._

It may seem strange to some people that a dinosaur can have a human family. But there is a reason. I shared my life with a human once, DelightsInOrchids, a human woman I met when we were still hiding in the rainforest. When DelightsInOrchids died, far too young, she left LittleOrchid to me to raise as my own. 

But even I know that a Real Person cannot raise a human child alone. I cannot dress her, or wash her, or even help her brush her hair - and so I am raising her with the sister of DelightsInOrchids. We share this little house with Sister, Sister's male mate, and her four male offspring. It gets noisy at times - seven mammals and a dinosaur sharing one small house – but this is home. 

Sister had turned back to her work. I could tell there was something getting on Sister’s nerves. Her bloodheat – which humans call ‘skin temperature’ - was broadcasting some sort of irritation, and I could read it clearly, but she clenched her lips tight on her teeth and said nothing. 

<You will be late for work,> LittleOrchid signed. 

I was not late for work. The Real People are never late. If I left home in the next 90 seconds, I would be exactly on time. 

<This is true,> I signed. <I must away. I came in only to see you.>

<Ice-cream tomorrow?>

<Of course!>

Today was the last night of the learning week, so tomorrow we would go to the green park, as we always do. LittleOrchid eats ice-cream. I eat a few pigeons. And we talk about whatever is happening this week. We make it a regular treat, just the two of us. It has become important, _far_ more important than mere ice-cream and pigeons would seem. 

<I must be off,> I said. <Come, LittleOrchid, assist me with my uniform?>

I have a human child to raise, which means I need a paying job. 

LittleOrchid slipped off the chair again, and brought me my uniform. It is a bright yellow reflective belt, with the word POLICIA printed on it in big black letters, just in case someone in the City does not yet know that I am the dinosaur detective. 

I straightened my spine, and stood still. LittleOrchid fussed under my throat, strapping the belt around my neck. She did up the buckle, and then leaned both small hands under my face and kissed me on my lower jaw.

I closed my eyes, savouring the scent of her. <Sleep well, little one,> I signed. <I will return in the morning.>

I angled around the table, careful not to sweep all the cooking-ware onto the floor with my tail. I left through the back door, around the side of the house again, and bounced over the garden wall into the street. 

I had barely landed on the street again, when I heard a human voice behind me. 

I had been pursued by SisterOfOrchids. She was rushing out of the front door, and following me into the street. 

I heard her singing as she came. _You! Murder-Lizard!_

I could see clearly the irritation her face. She had bottled it up in front of LittleOrchid but she certainly wasn’t hiding it from _me!_ She pointed a hard finger at my snout as if she would shoot me with it. 

_I-have-a-bone-to-pick-with-you!_

Well, of course no self-respecting dinosaur can accept a pointed finger in the face without answering! I screamed back, raising my killing-claws to match her pointing finger.

<What?> I signed. 

<Did you tell the child she has ugly hair?>

<Ugly hair?> I was not sure I understood the sign. 

<You read my sign perfectly well, lizard!> She parked both hands on her hips, and glared at me. 

I cocked my head, and stared at SisterOfOrchids, but she was not jesting. She was genuinely angry. <Your sign makes no sense to me, woman! Ugly hair? Hair that is ugly? I understand not?>

<This morning, I was brushing the child’s hair!>

<You do this every morning?>

<Well, this morning, she said she has ugly hair!>

<Ugly hair? Is not all hair … hairy? Surely hair is hair?>

Sister pursed her lips, and exhaled deeply. Her anger faded a little bit. 

<There is pale-people hair, which is straight, and then there is dark-people hair, which is curly. And she has dark-people hair. Someone told the child that dark-people hair is ugly.>

I hissed, feeling my killing-claws retract angrily. 

DelightsInOrchids told me about the hurtful beliefs humans have about the colour of their skins. I do not understand it, but I know it hurts. DelightsInOrchids was descended from the old forest tribes of this land. Her hair was long and fine. But LittleOrchid’s hair is curly and stiff. It stands up around her face, and her skin is chocolate-dark. She does not look _anything_ like the rest of her family.

<It is those girls at her learning-place again!> I signed at Sister. 

<The girls in her class?>

<Little poisonous snakes! Always scheming! Always plotting!>

<You cannot blame the children! This is your fault.>

<My fault!>

<She’s old enough to ask questions. She obviously gets her hair from her father.>

I cough-barked, before she could say what I knew she was going to say. <No! It is out of the question!>

<Life is hard enough for her without her mother! It is time to tell her who her father is!>

<I am her father!> I hissed, threatening. <Me! She is mine!>

<Her human sire is part of who she is!>

<Her human sire is _nothing! >_ I snaked my neck as I signed. <And besides, he is dead!>

I saw the surprise in her blood-heat. <He is dead?>

<He is _very_ dead!>

<You did not say that before!>

<It did not matter before!>

<Well, it matters _now!_ She is eleven years old! She is nearly a woman! It is time to tell her!>

<I will be the judge of that! When I think she is old enough!>

Sister looked down, and saw my killing-claws raised angrily. <You are as stubborn as my sister!>

But there is nothing she can do. She knows perfectly well that only I know who LittleOrchid’s human sire was. 

I hissed at her. <I think it is time to talk to the instructors again about those girls!> I signed. 

It wasn’t an answer at all, but Sister just sniffed angrily. <On that we agree, Murder-Lizard! I’m not having these Big-City people put their ideas in the child’s head!>

<How dare those little vipers criticise my child! I will not hesitate to take her from that learning-place if I find out those girls are picking at her again!>

I dropped my jaws open and screamed. The warm vapour of my breath steamed in my rage on the cold morning air. 

<You and I both spend far too much time telling her she is beautiful, for little excrements like those to tell her she has ugly hair!>

* * *

Sister’s interruption had made me late, but her information had made me rage. I ran through the streets, pounding hard on the roads, both to make up time and to work my anger off. 

It is time for another parent-instructor conference, I think – and one which the instructors will _not_ enjoy. I am paying far too much money in instruction fees for LittleOrchid to be bullied! There will be words! _Many_ words written on the learning place chalkboard, and I will _not_ hesitate to write all in capital letters!

It will not be the first time, either! It took _years_ before the humans understood that I _am_ LittleOrchid’s father. All school correspondence must be directed to me. All medical correspondence must be directed to me. I _am_ her legal father. DelightsInOrchids _herself_ wrote _my_ name on her paper of birth, and the stupid office-writer did not think to ask any questions, so there it is in writing: Father _: el dinosaurio Ruiz._ I _am_ the dinosaur Ruiz!And there is no clause anywhere in human law or in that certificate that says that a baby’s father _must_ be of the species _Homo sapiens._ I _am_ her legal father! 

I weaved rapidly through the moving traffic, leaping across parked vehicles, and over the rain-slick tar to my workplace. One of the passenger vehicles spotted me running, and blew on his horn to offer me a ride, but I sprinted away. Not tonight! 

I won't tell you which way I ran, from home to my work-place. Nor will I tell you where my child lives, or goes to learn. 

In fact, now that I think on it, let me be very clear, dear reader. I will leave out a lot of information from my story. Some of these omissions are because there is still much in the human world that I do not not understand. Other omissions are through my own nature, and my own choice to withhold what I know. So be warned, dear reader. Everything in my story is true, but many things are missing - and exactly _what_ is missing, you will have to decide for yourself. The whole truth is known only to me.

By the time I reached my workplace, exertion had calmed me down, as it always does. 

I presented myself at the gate, and was allowed through the steel gates and metal-detectors, and into the brilliant electric lights. I jogged into the large central room where my pack works, and came to a halt in the doorway, snaking my neck this way and that. I screamed, just in case there was another dinosaur in the building, but there was no reply. 

A few Capturers looked up, and squawked their greetings back at me, and then went back to work. 

I have shown you my Family. Now let me show you my Pack. 

I am a Capturer, in the City of Eternal Spring, and this is my workplace. 

I deal with kidnappings, extortion, and missing children mostly, often in tandem with a department called GAULA. I am very good at finding people. I can find anyone anywhere, and I never forget a scent.

I was the first, but there would have to be dinosaur detectives sooner or later. The Real People and humans are learning to live and work together all over the world. Unfortunately, that means that aberrant individuals of both species are _also_ learning to work together. With free will, reason, and intelligence comes plenty of chances to freely break laws, to commit crimes, and to do stupid and malevolent things to each other.

Or as my partner RedBrick says, _“They put their copulating heads together, and make more copulating work for us Capturers.”_

RedBrick was already at his desk. He raised his hands from his screen toy to sign, <I greet you, ScarBreast.>

<I greet you, RedBrick, friend and partner.>

I know RedBrick well. He works overnight with me, and we hunt well together. He has a human mate, and three young children, all slightly older than LittleOrchid. Good intelligent fierce girls, not like the sneaky snakes at LittleOrchid’s learning-place, and they like LittleOrchid. They teach her things – good things that big girls need to know.

I stalked around his desk, restless. I felt my tail hit something. A second later I heard the sound of glass breaking, and a human squawk, and I smelled the scent of coffee. 

<Apologies,> I signed. 

_Yourlossbrother,_ RedBrick said in his own language to the other human. He took the time to move his own coffee out of range. 

<You look frazzled,> he signed. 

<Is it that obvious?>

<It is to me,> he signed. 

<I am frazzled,> I admitted. I stalked around the office again. 

He raised both feet, and propped them up on his desk, balancing effortlessly on his seat. 

<Talk.>

<LittleOrchid is starting to ask about her sire.> I turned my head, and scratched the side of my jaw on the corner of the table. <It seems that some other girls are beginning to pester her about it.>

<Girls can be the statistical median.> he signed. 

That did not make sense, but I let it pass. I walked around the desk again, tapping my killing-claw. 

<Perhaps you should tell her who he is? Children want to know where they come from.>

<No. I cannot. She must never find out.>

<She is not stupid. She knows she had a human father.>

<You do not understand. She must never find out.>

<Why not?>

I closed my eyes, looking at his bloodheat. Humans are unconscious homeotherms. They cannot deliberately alter their body temperature, like we do, but shifts in emotions produce tiny changes in skin temperature. His skin temperature was steady, which mean his emotions were steady. 

I signed slowly. <LittleOrchid was not born in an act of love.>

He was a Capturer. He understood immediately. I saw the change in his bloodheat. 

<You see why I cannot tell her who her sire was. I never saw him. I only smelled his body on hers when she came back to me.>

<I thought…> His words trailed off and his hands dropped to his lap, leaving the signs in mid-air. 

<I should never have let her go into that town.! But she needed medicine! She was coughing so much! But when she went to the town, he was waiting for her. LittleOrchid is the result.>

<I am sorry!> RedBrick has a human mate, and three daughters. He knows about humans who prey on other humans. He fears them as much as I do, as much as any father of daughters. 

My bond-mate came back to me the morning after, and she collapsed with her arms around my neck. Her eyes leaked salt onto my scutes for hours. I held her and I raged silently, and I swore vengeance to the man who harmed my bond-mate, my darling heart, my sweet DelightsInOrchids…

LittleOrchid was the result of that awful night, nine months later. And I would rather pull out all my talons than tell her so. 

<Would you know his scent again?>

<I never forget a scent.>

RedBrick nodded his head. 

<Now LittleOrchid is old enough to ask questions,> I said. <And what am I to tell her?>

He shook his head. <I have no answer for you.>

<Neither do I,> I said. <If DelightsInOrchids was alive, she would know what to say. She was wise. I am not wise! How can I tell my child that she came about through violence?>

<So, lie. You are good at lying.>

<No, I am not!>

I saw him bare his teeth fiercely. <Quite.>

<Well, maybe, but I do not lie to LittleOrchid.>

<The older she is when she finds out, the worse it will be,> RedBrick signed. <She is eleven years old, now. She has not yet been through … I do not know the word for it.> He sketched a sign for milk-glands over his own chest. <It will be worse then.>

<I know not what to do.>

<Bring her around to my lair? You and I can watch some fights and eat some chocolate. She can spend some time with my girls.>

<That is a good idea.>

We were interrupted by a voice shouting my human name. _RUIZ!_

It was the Alpha of the station. He broke into the room, and his eyes immediately found me. 

<Alpha,> I signed politely, dipping my head and shuddering my jaw. <You command here.>

But he didn’t sign back. Instead he walked quickly to RedBrick’s desk, and turned on the Translator. It crackled as it came online. 

The Translator is a clever little machine. It listens to human sounds, and translates it into speech. It also takes speech, and translates it into human sounds. It has a very short range, and it only picks up our voices at exactly 39.17 Mhz - for some reason both WingWatch and SingsAlone insisted on that exact frequency, and since they designed it they had their way. 39.17 Mhz is right at the bottom end of our hearing range, so the effect is a gloomy rumbling monotone. It's not perfect, but it beats writing everything down.

BlueAlpha made a few squeaking noises into it, and the Translator turned his noises into speech. 

“Are you receiving me, ScarBreast?” 

I bared my teeth to show I had understood, and arched my neck down to speak slowly to the device. “I am receiving you, Alpha.”

Human squeaks and squawks came out of the Translator; my words in their weird singing language. 

I have been told that human noises are broken down into sounds and words, but I can’t hear it. I have learned to read their language, but I learned the way Deaf humans do – by memorisation. It’s not that I can’t _hear._ It’s that I can’t hear _words._ The Real People have what humans call ‘Auditory Verbal Agnosia.’ For humans, AVA is rare, and rarely found without brain damage. For us, it is simply the way our hearing develops. For us, human speech is an indistinguishable stream of squawking, and they can't hear _our_ speech at all. 

The Alpha spoke, and the Translator did its job again. “We have a case that I’m putting into your hands.”

“A murder?” I asked quickly. 

“No. A missing person. InGen called us tonight. One of their BloodWeavers has disappeared.” 

“I will find him,” I promised. 

I am very, _very_ good at what I do. However, I am also the only dinosaur detective, so _naturally_ every dinosaur-related docket automatically falls to me. Who better to investigate a dinosaur case than a dinosaur? 

RedBrick opened his desk drawer, and pulled out the vehicle key. <Let us go, my friend. To hunt!>

* * *

We hit the road in two minutes. Such a strange phrase, but very evocative – ‘hit the road.’ 

RedBrick pulled the car out through the sliding gate of the station, and a moment later we were on the road. 

The Capturers have modified a pool vehicle, just for me. I cannot sit in a front seat of a normal vehicle, and I _refuse_ to lie on the back seat like a dog. The passenger’s seat was removed completely, so that I can crouch with my talons on the instrument panel and my tail on the back seat. I don’t have a seat belt, so if RedBrick brakes hard I’ll be propelled through the front like a rocket, but one can’t have everything. 

As soon as I get in, I pressed the tip of my talon against the button that slides down the side windows. I do not like driving with the windows closed. With RedBrick’s hands on the steering wheel there was no way for him to Sign, so we rode together in friendly silence. 

The BloodWeaver's offices are in the currency-earning part of the city. It’s an ugly concrete block, in a city full of ugly concrete. The lights were still on all over the building, and over the grass. 

<They are up late,> RedBrick signed. 

<Something is wrong,> I agreed.

We introduced ourselves at the main entrance, and were let in. By ‘introduced ourselves,’ I mean that RedBrick showed his warrant card, and I just snarled at the guard until he opened the turnstile. The lead BloodWeaver was waiting for us as soon as we emerged from the lifting-box. 

As soon as I turned my snout to him, I smelled the stress oozing out of his skin. Not _fear,_ which I might have put down to his proximity to a Real Person. Instead I could smell a rank stink from his skin – a cold dread that had been weighing on him for hours. 

<My name is Shadow,> he signed, and made a little bow. <I am glad you came so soon.>

I returned the bow with a snarl. 

<You speak excellent HumanSign,> I said, impressed by someone who is not bonded to a Real Person speaking so well. 

<I work a great deal with the Real People,> Shadow said. <And with StripeSide in particular. I am trying to solve the Egg Question.>

RedBrick moved suddenly. <The Egg Question?>

Shadow looked at me. I made a gesture to tell him to explain. 

<You know that all the Real People, except StripeSide and WingWatch, are descended from the eight Real People on the Island of Clouds.>

<Yes, and I know that they escaped the island in the supply boats, and hid in the rainforest for generations.>

<Since then, they have only been able to reproduce with each other, and now they have a severe genetic bottleneck. Every generation, less viable eggs are laid.>

<I myself have never fathered a viable egg, not one.> I interjected. 

<I’m sorry,> RedBrick said. 

<I don’t mind now,> I said. <LittleOrchid is my child.>

<Within a few generations, they may go extinct, all over again. The question is, what is the solution? Do they lay more eggs? Or do they turn to us, BloodWeavers, to create a new generation of designer babies for them? Opinion is divided, between StripeSide's group, who believe they can survive without human help, and those led by GoldenCycad, who believe they need those designer babies. That is the Egg Question.>

<I see,> RedBrick said. 

I hiss-snapped. <You did not send for us to discuss the Egg Question.>

<No,> Shadow agreed. <And I am very glad they sent you.>

<All dinosaur questions come to me,> I signed back to him. <We heard one of your people was kidnapped?>

<We do not know,> he signed. 

<Clarify?> I glanced at RedBrick. He had put the Translator down, but did not turn it on. He was watching and listening, but leaving the interview to me. 

<One of our BloodWeavers took a leave of absence for yesterday. He was supposed to come back today. But he did not come.>

<Perhaps he is ill?> I signed. 

<No,> he signed, shaking his head in the human gesture for No. <I was worried. I sent a human around to his accommodation. The place is dark. He is gone, and not answering calls.>

<Have you contacted GAULA?>

GAULA is the department of the Capturers that deals with kidnappings, missing persons and extortion. I work with them closely. 

<Not yet. I wanted to speak to you first,> the BloodWeaver said, and his tongue flicked over his lips. <Also. You should know. We have found something missing.>

So, this was only a theft, and not a kidnapping? Then why did he look so stressed? 

<What did he take?>

<Biological samples.>

I saw a wince cross his face. It was a tiny movement, but I have been a Capturer long enough to know that when people wince I should keep asking questions until answers fall out. 

<What sort of biological samples?> I pressed. 

I saw the wince again. <Samples of the Influence, taken from birds.>

I couldn’t help myself, I pulled backward away from him, with a shudder of my jawbone. Not a theft, but a _nightmare._ “The Influence!” I said aloud. 

_Whatisthatsign?_ RedBrick spoke in human. 

_BirdFlu,_ Shadow said. 

I felt my head and neck waving from side to side in anxiety. <How did he get the Influence? Where did you get it?>

<It came from a chicken farm in the Rich Coast. A whole farm of chickens died, and a group of humans in the area also got sick.>

<You keep _that_ – _here! > _

<It is kept in a Bio Safety Level 4 Glass-house!> Shadow signed. <Under strict security!>

<Not secure enough, clearly!> Now I understood why Shadow smelled so stressed! 

<InGen does not _only_ study the Egg Question here, ScarBreast! We study all things that may threaten your people. We receive samples here, from all over the world, and we and study them, and share what we learn with the Island of Clouds, and the Alpha of Alphas.>

<And now you have lost some!>

<Yes. We think our missing BloodWeaver stole throat and vent samples. This particular weave of the Influence has already jumped once, from humans to chickens. One more gene mutation, and it _could_ jump into dinosaurs… It is much too dangerous to mess around with! We need it back!>

I growled. 

<And you – ScarBreast – I know you are the dinosaur detective. They say that there is no-one you cannot find.>

Right now, the dinosaur detective could feel the walls closing in around him! I wanted to run home, turn off all the lights, and curl up protectively around LittleOrchid all night. Which was precisely what I could _not_ do. He was right – I _am_ the dinosaur detective. I cannot run away, I have a duty to do.

I hiss-snapped. <If I am to find him, I need something to work upon> I said, <I need his scent.>

<And his address,> RedBrick added. <Known associates, his screen-toys, his personal paperwork.>

<I will show you his office,> Shadow said. 

He led us out of his office, and down the corridor, and down stairs flanked with glass. The air smelled of antiseptic, and new plastic flooring. Down the hall, the smell in the air abruptly changed to the smell of papers, and coffee, and printer ink. 

Shadow opened a door. 

I thrust my head in the doorway, pushing the door open with my snout so that I could get a scent trace before anyone else. 

The scent immediately told me that it was a glass-place, filled with high tables and shiny glass equipment and screen-toys. I could pick up the smell of the human who spent the most time here. He was older, unfit, with too much sweet sugar coming from his pores. Otherwise he smelled healthy, with no dandruff or skin problems. Also quite well-washed, which is more rare than most humans like to admit. 

On that aside, dear readers, _always_ wash your hands after touching someone else’s screen-toy. 

There was a desk, with the name of the missing man on it. 

ROGER ACKROYD.

<Observe the name,> I said to RedBrick.

<I see it,> he agreed. <I name this person Missing Three-Seven-Two.>

<Agreed, he is now Missing Three-Seven-Two.>

Shadow looked between us, back and forth. <Three-Seven-Two?>

RedBrick spoke to him in Human Song, at some length. I knew what he was saying – he was explaining about kidnappings, missing persons, GAULA, case-loads. 

I have hundreds of missing persons – if I just called them all ‘the missing person’ without naming them, we will all get very confused very quickly. And when Capturers get confused, cases get thrown out of court. So each missing person gets a Real Person name, which is usually just a number. That way, rather than spell out every time, "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd," I can just sign out the number, "Missing Three-Seven-Two." 

I pulled open a few drawers on the desk with my talons, and sniffed inside. The screen-toy was dark. I tried to press it on, but it just went clunk, and nothing happened on the screen. <Broken?>

<Does he work with other humans?> RedBrick asked. <Anyone here that he would confide in?>

<None. He does not make friends easily.> Shadow was watching me as if he had never seen Capturers at work before. 

<What does he work on?>

<Scanning for the Influence, mostly. We have been trying to establish how many genetic changes would be needed, for the Influence to cross between birds and dinosaurs.>

I restrained a shudder. 

<Where does he keep the Influence itself?> I asked. 

<Below, in a glass-house. I would show you but I cannot. You may not enter the room, without a protective suit, and a face-mask allowing no leaks, and a cleansing shower, and an air hose to breathe…>

<Never mind!> I could not imagine anything worse than being trapped in a small glass box with only the Influence for company. 

<Any dinosaurs in his family?>

<No. He said he had never met a Real Person before he came here. Actually…> I saw Shadow hesitate, his hands slowing. 

<Clarify?>

<He did not seem interested in the Real People. 

<Clarify?>

<He did not talk much about the Real People. He was not curious to meet you. He even avoided WingWatch, and everyone likes WingWatch.>

That was rare among BloodWeavers. We know perfectly well that the BloodWeavers retrieved us from extinction by finding our blood in mosquitoes in old amber. We exist today because of the BloodWeavers’ art, and the BloodWeavers know it too. Most of them are _fascinated_ by us. A BloodWeaver who isn’t interested in the Real People is an oddity. 

RedBrick signed, <How much do you think those samples will sell for? If they reach the Black Market?>

<I know not. This has not happened before. But I am sure it will be a great deal.>

<He will not lack for customers,> I said. 

<What exactly did he steal? What are we seeking here, this night?>

<Eggs.>

<Eggs?> I signed sharply.

<Chicken eggs!> he clarified, signing very quickly. <Not dinosaur eggs, fear not! We do not break StripeSide's law! We do wish to assist with the Egg Question, but not like that. We hope to convince StripeSide to change the law.>

<Of course,> I signed. 

<We know he clocked into the Level 3 glass-house at 9 hours late, the night before last. We know he took incubating eggs, and injected them with the Influence, and then he left with them.>

<Why eggs?> I asked. 

<We use eggs here to grow the Influence to great enough size that we can study it. When the eggs have incubated, he will be able to extract the Influence. But incubating the eggs will take time. And he will need to keep them in a safe and warm place.>

<How long until the eggs are ready?>

<It takes two days before they can be harvested. By tomorrow morning, he will have enough of the Influence to do whatever he wants to do with it.>

I shuddered from my snout to my tail. <Fear not. We will find him.>

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 39.170 Mhz is the frequency of God, according to the Amazing James Randi. God uses radio - and also God is a woman, and sounds exactly like Peter Popoff's wife Elizabeth.


	3. Chapter 3

When we got to the vehicle, RedBrick got in, but did not start the engine immediately. Instead he turned on the overhead light, turning the vehicle into a cocoon of light. 

<You look distressed, ScarBreast/>

<No,> I signed. 

<Don’t lie to me. I saw you raising your killing-claws.>

I screamed at him. I saw him flinch. 

My voice at such close quarters must have hammered at his little mammal ears like a fire-weapon on fully-automatic. No matter how often I am reminded, every time I scream I forget. 

But RedBrick had lived through the wars of the white-powder kings, when every street corner could turn into a crime scene in an instant. He is not intimidated by mere dinosaurs. He snapped his fingers at my snout. 

<Clarify, ScarBreast!>

The walls of the vehicle were closing in around me like a tight glass box. I pulled the door latch open, and rolled out onto the wet tar. 

_SCARBREAST!_ RedBrick shouted after me. 

I wanted to explain, but I could not sit still and explain. I leaped away from the vehicle, and then whipped around, and leaped. 

I jumped up onto the front panel of the vehicle, my claws balancing on the shiny alloy. 

RedBrick stared at me through the shield-of-the-wind. His face was turned yellow by the overhead light. He reached over the dashboard and switched the Translator on, without looking away from my eyes. 

I lowered myself to stare at him through the shield-of-the-wind, doubling my legs up under me. I gripped the vents under the shield-of-the-wind with my talons. 

“The Influence has come before,” I said slowly to him, through the glass. 

“Has it? When?” he said, through the Translator. 

“Years ago, when I was young, when TravelsOverWater still ruled, when we were still hiding in the Rain Forest.”

He said nothing. 

I closed my nictitating membranes, and then closed my eyes. I continued. 

“The Influence came. It followed the couriers from pack to pack. It flowed across the rainforest like a wave, like a mist of death, and everywhere it went the Real People died. When it reached my pack, all six of my packmates died, one by one, around me. I would have died with them, but for DelightsInOrchids.” 

I lay sick for three days and nights. I remember the blood running from my nostrils and my vents, I remember the pain inside my legs and my head. I remember DelightsInOrchid’s voice, and her hands as she wiped the blood and phlegm from my eyes and nose … but other than that I don’t remember anything else. For three days I lay sick while my packmates died around me. 

And when I awoke again, only SnailEater and I remained alive, from my whole pack. Parents, siblings, SnailEater’s bondmate Wasp - my pack all died together in a storm of blood. For humans, the idea of a plague wiping out their civilization is a delicious horror story to frighten themselves; something to watch with LittleOrchid. But I have _lived_ it. 

“And what the Influence did then, it can do again. Because we all share the same blood.” 

“I know about the Egg Question,” RedBrick said. 

“The Egg Question is the reason why the Influence is so terrible. We are all almost copies of each other. A disease for one, is a disease for all.”

“This is not just a theft,” RedBrick said. 

“No,” I said. “This is a threat to our existence.” 

RedBrick clenched his fists on the steering wheel. I could not hear his tone through the Translator, but I could see his eyes. 

“Hear me now, ScarBreast! We will not let that happen!” the Translator said. “Listen to me! We will not let you go!”

“I know,” I said. 

I knew he was sincere. I knew he would _try._ But I do not think humans can stop the Influence, not even with all their technology and their power. They could not stop it in 1918, and I do not believe they can stop it now.

The radio barked, making me jump. I don’t pay attention to the constant noise flowing from the humans’ devices. It’s unintelligible static, a constant clattering racket. It’s part of living in a city, and I have learned to tune it out. But this one echoed through the speaker as well. 

RedBrick grabbed the receiver, and spoke into it. 

The Translator automatically translated the words it heard.

“There has been a murder,” the Despatcher said. “In the alley behind the Blue Bird. CSI is expecting you.”

“We’re not Homicide,” RedBrick said, glancing at me. “And we’re already on a priority case.”

“Trust me, you two are going to **_want_** to see this one.” 

“Really?”

“Yes, really.” 

He hooked the receiver back up, and looked at me through the glass again. 

“Shall we go?”

“Yes,” I said, with a shudder. 

The door was still open, and I eeled in through the door, and yanked it shut behind me. RedBrick was already starting the car. 

* * *

We saw the flashing blue lights, and knew that we had found the right place. RedBrick pulled the car over next to others of the Blue Pack, and we both got out and stood looking around for a moment. 

There was a crowd of Uniforms standing around the mouth of an alleyway. I wove my way through them, and ducked under the yellow tape. Within a few strides, I saw what had aroused the Despatcher so. 

I stopped and stared. At my side, RedBrick stared too. All the blood had left RedBrick’s face. This was the first time he’d seen what one of _us_ can do to his kind. 

The human was dead. Very dead. 

He lay on his back on blood-painted cement. I could see the hole in his body where his gut had been punched out. A purple rope of intestine stretched away down the alleyway. 

There were scrabbled smears around him where he had clawed desperately at the concrete while bleeding out, fighting to hang onto the last few minutes of his life. The smell of blood was overpoweringly strong, and fresh. He had not been dead for long. 

Even humans could smell _that._

<Did a Real Person do this?> RedBrick signed fast, and then clapped his hand over his nose and mouth. 

<Yes,> I signed. There was no point in lying. Nothing else kills like that.

The alleyway was lit up by flood-lights, and the flashing lights from the main road, and yellow crime-scene stickers. The silent corpse was the centre of a complex dance of human activity. He was emptied of all drama, and yet at the same time he was the heart of another drama, in which he was the star character. 

The SpeakerForTheDead had spotted us. She turned away from some other humans, and walked over to us. She nodded her head to me, and said something to RedBrick. 

I coughbarked, and swung my head to RedBrick. He translated her words into Human Sign for me. <She says it took a _long_ time. He died hard.>

<He did,> I agreed. We could both see the smears of blood from the dead man’s struggles. <I know this place. Is that not a drinking-place, here? Did anyone hear him?>

RedBrick asked the SpeakerForTheDead. 

She bent down. She pulled out a small light, and pointed it closely at the corpse’s throat. 

<She says to observe the hole in his throat,> RedBrick translated for me. <She said that whoever did this punctured his throat first so he could not cry out.>

<Does she yet know his name?> I asked. 

RedBrick translated again. No, she did not. The corpse had been carrying no identity papers, no keys, nothing at all to say who he was.

<What on earth was he doing here?> RedBrick signed. <There is nothing here.>

For a moment, the two humans stood and looked around. The alleyway had only blank walls, and concrete. There were no doors, and before the Capturers arrived there were no lights either. It must have been dark as coal, earlier – a convenient place for a predator to lie in wait for his prey.

<A dinosaur did this,> RedBrick signed. <So we have no fingerprints.>

<The rain has already washed away most of the evidence,> the SpeakerForTheDead signed. 

<I must get a scent trace while I can,> I signed.

I leaned down and thrust my head against the corpse’s cold chest, smelling his blood, sniffing loudly and deeply. His shirt and jacket were ice cold and wet. 

SpeakerForTheDead screamed. Her fists battered at my face. 

_GETOUT GETOUT YOU ARECONTAMINATING MYCRIMESCENE! GET OUT!_

Her fists hammered on my face, and I felt RedBrick grab my neck and drag my head around, away from the corpse. I allowed the two humans to drag me away from the corpse, and I let them hustle me back under the yellow tape, almost pushing me out of the crime scene. 

<RedBrick!> I signed, spinning around. 

<Go, go, go,> RedBrick signed to me, from the inside of the yellow tape. <I will speak to her!>

<I will return to the vehicle.>

I hesitated with my hand on the crime scene tape, looking back and wondering if there was anything I had left undone. I could think of nothing. With a shake of the head, I passed out through the flickering blue lights, and returned to the vehicle.

It was some time before RedBrick returned. <She is very angry!> he signed. <What did you do that for?>

<I wanted to catch the scent before the rain comes down again.>

<You could have contaminated the crime scene!>

<The rain would have washed it away anyway! And in any case, I thought I could recognise the killer by scent!>

He hesitated. _< Did_ you?>

<No. All I smelled in there was myself. And him.>

RedBrick started walking back to the vehicle.

<That man _was_ killed by a Real Person,> he said. It was a question, rather than a statement. 

I fell into pace beside him across the street, my tail sliding from side to side as we went. <Yes. Of that, you may have no doubt.>

<This victim is not our missing person?>

<No. This is another case altogether. This is not Missing Three-Seven-Two.>

<Two dinosaur-related cases on the same night, my friend,> he signed, stopping at the vehicle. <This is strange.>

I leaned my hip against the side of the vehicle. 

He leaned against the vehicle as well, matching my stance. <A dinosaur killed a human.>

<The killing of humans is against the Inter-Species Mutual Aid Treaty. StripeSide will be furious.>

<And yet it has happened. Someone does not care about StripeSide’s anger.>

<Truth, this,> I agreed. 

<I told the Speaker for the Dead to keep us informed, and that we have two cases tonight,> RedBrick said. 

<A Real Person did this,> I said. <This case will fall to us to investigate. But not yet. Let us leave the Speaker for the Dead to do her work. Come now, we have no role here now! Let us return to our other case.>

<Agreed,> RedBrick pulled the vehicle door open. 

* * *

We found the address given to us by Doctor Shadow easily. It was a nice place, in a nice part of the City, with nice broad streets, and working lights. 

At the entrance RedBrick had to show his warrant card to the human lair-keeper, who guards the human homes at night. But we have grounds to enter without a warrant, since InGen called us. They call it a ‘welfare call,’ when the Capturers open someone’s home to find out what has happened to them. 

No Capturer likes welfare calls. The worst-smelling corpses I have seen have _all_ been ‘welfare calls.’ On an aside, dear reader, I whole heartedly discourage _anyone_ from attempting anything of that sort. This is _not_ how one wants to be found, leaking liquids into a carpet for long days in a hot climate. I’m sure I don’t need to explain. 

And for us Capturers, the worst part is yet to come, since we have to find the family of the dead and tell them what happened, without telling them _too much_ about what happened. No Capturer likes welfare calls. 

At any rate, before RedBrick had even opened the door, I knew what we would find inside. The smell had already come out to meet me. 

I blocked RedBrick’s entry, by ramming my snout against the back of his wrist. He pulled his hand back and looked at me.

<Call the Speaker for the Dead,> I signed. 

<You are sure?>

<I smell death here. Call her!>

<I call now!>

He pulled out his portable screen-toy. I heard it make a signal, and connect. While he spoke, I pushed the door open with my snout. 

The inside was dark. I paused in the threshold. I could see no heat inside at all – not that I expected to. 

It reeked in there. I could feel the contamination on me, as if it was touching me in the dark, as if the stench itself could make me sick. I could feel my scutes creeping with chill. I did not want to go in there. 

But I am a Capturer, and I have a job to do. I swallowed down my horror, and pushed the rest of the way in. Luckily, humans cannot see blood-heat. They need sophisticated equipment just to view even the most basic thermal changes. My quick moment of horror was not noticed by RedBrick. 

I followed my snout into a small enclosed space that smelled of soggy death, and into the main living space of the home. I could make out the light from the windows, just enough to see a human shape on the floor. 

There was not a scrap of bloodheat left in him. And there was a huge hole in his chest. 

_ZAP!_ Light stabbed my eyes! 

I snapped my eyes closed. RedBrick had found the switch and snapped the lights on. He stood at the doorway, one gloved hand on the switch. All the heat flowed out of his face in a rush. 

_Ohshit,_ he said.

<Another one,> I signed, blinking my eyes. 

<There are times I do not envy your sense of smell.>

<In truth there are times I envy your _lack_ of a sense of smell!>

<The Murder team is on its way,> he signed. <Touch nothing!>

<Trust me, I have no reason to touch this one!>

I walked carefully around the dead human. There was not a lot of blood on him. There was instead a lot of fluid _under_ him. He had been dead a few days, in a hot climate. 

<Two people killed by Real People in one night!> RedBrick signed. 

<This one was not killed by a Real Person!>

<Clarify?>

<No Real Person did this. And he was not killed tonight.>

<How do you know?>

<I can smell no Real Person here,> I signed. 

<You know scent does not stand in court! We require evidence!>

This, I know all too well. Smell is not evidence in a human legal system – DNA is, and eyewitness testimony is, but not smell. Unfortunately, we already tried a test case, and the accused was acquitted in spite of the fact that I smelled him all over the scene. We Capturers know he did it – but knowing he did it, and proving he did it are two different things. I cannot stand in court and testify to what things smell like. Smell gives me probable cause, but I cannot stand in court and testify to what things smell like. I need forensic triangulation. 

<This, I know. But observe the floor. No blood. And see also, the wall there! There is no blood spatter.>

RedBrick looked around, and nodded agreement. <There is no blood spatter.>

<So this victim was not killed here,> I signed. <And look at the size of this room? Observe _my_ height? A killing kick requires a leap, in order to raise sufficient velocity for the kick. But there is no clearance in here for such a leap! In such close quarters, a Real Person would bite.>

<So he was dead before the hole was made in his chest,> RedBrick agreed. 

<He was killed elsewhere, and moved.>

<You are sure?>

<The Speaker for the Dead will corroborate. Someone wanted to make it _look_ as if a Real Person killed this man.>

<Why?> RedBrick signed. 

<I know not. But we must return to Shadow, and tell InGen that we found their man.>

<This is not InGen’s man!> RedBrick said. 

<Clarify?>

<This is not Missing Three-Seven-Two. Look at his face.>

RedBrick knelt down, carefully keeping his knees clear of the soaked carpet. He was wearing gloves, and he brought out the picture that Shadow had given us. He held the picture next to the corpse’s face. I bent low, snarling thoughtfully, and I compared the two.

Even in death, I could tell it was not the same man. This man had long darker hair. 

<Then who is this, and what on earth is he doing here?> I signed. 

<No idea,> RedBrick said. 

I was still stooping low over the corpse, and suddenly I caught a whiff of scent. Just the trace of scent, just a wisp.

<I know him!> I signed. 

<How?>

The scent was rising off his hair. I bent lower, my snout almost touching the corpse’s hair. 

RedBrick squawked, and signed something, but I already had my eyes half closed, inhaling deeply, trying to filter out a scent I knew. 

His identity was already being erased by death, a noxious stink that swamps all dignity from the dead. But under it, I could just smell hot grease. Petroleum. Alcohol. Dish-washing liquid. 

And under that … a lingering scent. An impression flashed across my mind – a memory of a quick grin and flashing eyes, a showy confident bloodheat. A young man with a restless burning energy – a friend. 

“I do know you!” I mourned privately. “I _did_ know you! I am so very sorry.” I felt myselt timbering with sorrow. 

_ScarBreast…_ I felt RedBrick touch my hip. 

I drew myself up, rocking back onto my hocks, my distress throbbing in my throat. <I knew him well. He was one of mine.>

<One of yours? One of your street children? The Disposables?>

<He was. He is all grown up now. We called him MarkOfGold, on the streets.>

<You are sure?>

<I never forget a scent, RedBrick! He was one of mine.>

Oh, MarkOfGold, I am so sorry! If I did wrong this night, it has surely been revisited on you. Oh, unfair, unfair, unfair fate, that takes away a young man in his health and his prime, and leaves him in a state like this! 

<I am sorry, ScarBreast.>

<He was a teenager when I met him. We got him off the streets, and back into school, and he cleaned himself up. He was doing so well! I lost track of him after he left school. What on earth is he doing here?>

<And who killed him?> RedBrick signed. <And where has Missing Three-Seven-Two gone?>

<I don’t know where MarkOfGold has been these last few years, but I think I know who will.>

<Who?>

<I must go and interview some of my Covert Informants.>

<Your street children.>

<MarkOfGold was one of them once. They may know what he was doing lately.>

<I will wait here for the Murder Capturers,> he said. 

<Do so, and I will meet you at the Station!>

I turned, careful not to bump anything in the crime scene with my tail, and headed for the door. 

<Go safely, ScarBreast,> he said. 

I paused in the door, and looked back at him. <I am a Real Person! What can harm me?>

<I know not,> he signed. His eyes were sombre. <Go safely. I have a bad feeling about this night.>

I jerked my head up and down. <You go safely as well, my friend. I will meet you at the Station.>

* * *

This City is big, but those of us who walk its streets at night know each other. 

I made my way to the railway station, under the bridge. I stood against the cement column, and there I waited. 

We Real People know how to wait, but I did not wait long. Within minutes they started to emerge around me like ghosts, as if coming out of the drains. Some of them _were_ coming out of the drains. In a few minutes I was surrounded by them. 

These are the Disposables, the lost children of the City. They were scrawny, thanks to the hardship of their lives. Many of them smell strongly of the glue they sniff, or a drug made from white-powder and brick dust. Two of the girls had cheap rancid paint on their faces to make them seem older, even though they are barely older than LittleOrchid. 

The Disposables scratch through rubbish, sell what they can, steal where they can, and amuse themselves by sniffing glue on cold nights. They live hard and die easily, and nobody cares. Throw away something into a rubbish bin, and it will not be long before a small child appears like magic to dig it out again. 

Don’t take me wrong. It is not that I do not know that the street children can be vicious. Many of them _are_ vicious – but children should _never_ learn to be vicious in the first place! 

Among the Real People, every hatchling is a precious treasure, a defeat against the odds, a rebellion against extinction. Hatchlings are _protected!_ But for some reason human children often aren’t. There are some things in the human world that the Real People find unacceptable, and this is one of them. 

I watch over the Disposables, as best I can. I am a Capturer, and they hate and fear Capturers – but I am also a dinosaur, and all very small humans seem to be fascinated by dinosaurs. I watch over them, and I keep the ‘street cleaning committees’ away from them. 

In turn, they talk to me, and tell me things they would never tell another Capturer. As a creature of the night, I sleep during the day, but through the eyes and ears of the Disposables I know all that happens on the streets of the City of Eternal Spring.

<I greet you all,> I said, looking around me at my little audience.

<I greet you,> said one little girl with too much paint on her face. 

<I wish to thank you for your assistance yesterday,> I said. 

<Did you manage to catch the Bad Man?>

I hiss-snapped. <I did catch him. I caught him well! He will never hurt anyone ever again!>

This news went down well with them. I saw them bare their teeth. How and why I stopped the Bad Man did not concern them. They are so inured to the violence of the streets at night, nothing I do surprises them. 

<Now I have a question for you all. Do you know a boy called MarkOfGold?>

They looked at each other, and chattered among themselves. MarkOfGold must be nearly twenty years old now – too old for most of these children to remember. 

<I know MarkOfGold,> one of the older boys at the back of group said. He was older than the others, but he still runs with them because his brain is a little damaged by alcohol. <He is not on the street any more. He is much older than us.>

<He is dead.>

They took this news without surprise. Violent death happens often, in the shacks where they grew up. 

I snarled at the older boy. <I want to know where he worked, who he ran with, where he got his money?>

<The last time I saw him,> the boy said, scrunching his face up, <He was with GoodButStrong. He was at LetTheChildrenLive.>

I know Let The Children Live very well. The man who runs that place is a good man; too soft for the size of his task, but strong enough to take it on anyway. That is an admirable trait, and I named him GoodButStrong for this reason. We work together often, trying to get some of these children off the streets. 

He will be sad, I think. We both thought MarkOfGold was one of our successes. 

<I will go and talk to GoodButStrong,> I said. <I thank you.>

There was some more chattering in the human language. The discussion was broken by one of the boys shifting to Sign. <Tell him!> he signed. 

<Tell me, what?> I asked. 

<Does MarkOfGold have something to do with SmallNeedle?> the little girl asked. 

<Not that I know of,> I said. <Clarify?>

<She is missing. She went with the picture-takers yesterday, and didn’t come back.>

<Wait,> I asked, snapping my teeth to shut the argument up. <What picture-takers?>

<They take pictures of us, and then they move away,> said the little girl. <SmallNeedle tried to steal a camera, but they keep too far away.>

I cocked my head. There are people taking pictures of the Disposables? Why? I might not be a great genius like StripeSide, but I know when I hear something strange. This is strange. Strange is suspicious. I _dislike_ strange.

<Maybe SmallNeedle found a bed for the night?> I suggested. 

<The picture-takers came back today, but not SmallNeedle.>

<Yes, the picture-takers came back,> another child said. <They asked me all sorts of questions.>

<They tried to get _me_ to go with them,> one little boy said proudly. <But I told them, No, son of a whore!>

<No, you didn’t, you liar!> said another little boy the same age.

<They want to chop us up for transplant organs…> said the first little boy. 

<Liar!> said the second little boy. 

<That’s why they take pictures of us! To see how big our kidneys are!> the first boy insisted. <They’ve already taken SmallNeedle! They’ll come for me next!>

<Don’t be dumb!> the second boy said. <Nobody wants your kidneys, you have HIV!>

I snapped my teeth at him to stop the argument. <You have not told the Capturers about SmallNeedle?> I signed. 

<You are a Capturer!>

This seemed to amuse them all greatly, and they laughed. 

I waited for the laughter to finish. <I want you to do something for me!> I ordered. <I want those cameras. Bring one to me!>

<We can do that,> the little girl promised. 

<Money?>

<I have money,> I said. <And I will pay. Whatever is on those camera, I want them! I want to know what these picture-takers are about! Bring one to me!>

<You want it, you got it, Capturer,> the boy said.

* * *

After that, I did something else that Capturers are not supposed to do, but which I think we all do anyway, one way or another. I made a small detour, and reported to my Alpha. 

I knew exactly where StripeSide would be, on this night: in the garden where wealthy humans like to play that game with metal sticks and small balls here. They don’t really like having StripeSide lairing in their garden, but she goes where she pleases. And this place is beautiful. 

The grass is smooth and soft. There are shady trees and flowers, and cleverly hidden walkways, and plenty of fresh water. The park smells of damp earth, and growing things. I could hear frogs chattering, sounding exactly like a human staff meeting. 

I trotted over the grass, head low, sniffing out the scents of the Real People. I found StripeSide with a group of other Real People, standing under a line of trees, looking out at me over the sweep of black glistening grass. They had already seen my bloodheat coming, and smelled me, and they all watched from the dark as I jogged over. 

“StripeSide!” I called out to her. “Alpha of Alphas!”

She slid into the moonlight, and came to meet me, leaving the rest of the Pack in the darkness. I stopped politely and allowed her to approach. 

“You rule here,” I said. 

“I rule here!”

StripeSide’s human name was once merely her colour – the human word for ‘blue.’ 

She hatched in captivity on the Island of Clouds, until FirstHuman helped her escape to the rainforest. Within a year she had challenged TravelsOverWater for the right to lead, and decided that we would hide no longer, and led us all out of the rainforest. It was StripeSide who negotiated the Inter-Species Mutual Aid Agreement between our species and the human leaders. It is thanks to StripeSide that Real People live freely all over the planet today, sharing life with humans as equals. She has ruled ever since, and in that time the Real People have flourished. 

Not that you should take my word for any of this. I am the most unreliable of narrators.

StripeSide snapped her teeth at me as she approached. She is not tall for a Real Person, but she radiates confidence and power. The burden of rule has taken its toll on her, and she looks much older than she is, but she is still Alpha of Alphas, and as powerful as ever. She is one of the most impressive dinosaurs I have ever met. 

“I was not expecting you tonight, ScarBreast,” she greeted me. 

I turned to face her as she stalked around me, and hissed back. Her tail snaked from side to side, and her golden eyes raked me up and down. 

“Nor did I expect to come here, but this is an emergency, and I must speak with you.”

“Why do you smell of human blood?”

“We must speak. Alone.”

“Must?” She raised her killing-claws in a challenge. “What is ‘must’ to me?”

I raised my own killing-claws, and turned myself perpendicular to her, setting myself deliberately across her. “I insist upon it!”

“You had better support your insistence!” 

“I will!” I cried out, and sprang at her. 

She met me in the air, jaws snapping. I am taller and faster, but StripeSide is _incredibly_ strong. Her strength sent me tumbling. I threw her off me with my claws against her belly, and rolled away.

She let us separate, and climbed back to her feet, lashing her tail. 

I sprang back up. “Ha!” I said. “You can _fight._ But can you run?” 

I leaped away. Her teeth snapped shut behind my haunch, and then she was chasing me. 

We raced across the grass, leaping the sand-traps, and zipping along the pathways.

The joy of movement! Pure speed! Unrestrained violence! It is glorious to throw off the self-discipline I maintain around humans! At all times, I must maintain self-control, I must rein in my strength, constrain my body to avoid hurting my fragile human friends. It is glorious once in a while to use all my speed and power at once, to explode outside civility, to become a dinosaur among dinosaurs! 

We ran and we ran, criss-crossing the park. 

At last, I collapsed onto the grass, exhausted. I went down on all fours, and StripeSide dropped at my side. I could feel every blood vessel, strained open to lose the heat of my exercise. 

StripeSide collapsed on her side, her blue-grey flank heaving with pants. Our bloodheat matched – **_hot hot hot hot_** – but I saw the gleam of satisfaction in her eyes. 

“That was good fun!” 

“Excellent!” 

She had drawn blood on my neck, and I closed up the blood vessels there to stop the bleeding. She too was narrowing the bloodvessels where I had kicked her. She raised her head from the grass, with a hiss, and rolled herself upright. 

A little flashing light was coming over the grass, walking toward us. The breeze brought his scent ahead of him. 

“Ah, FirstHuman comes,” she said.

FirstHuman probably heard the sound of us fighting, and followed the noise. He walked over to us across the grass, taking his own sweet time about it in that way humans have. 

When he reached us, he propped the light upward in the turf so that he could speak Sign, and reached out a familiar hand for StripeSide’s shoulder. She twisted her head to look at her human fondly. He is StripeSide’s bond-mate, and she confides in him in all things. There are no secrets from him – even if I told him nothing, she would tell him immediately. 

For a moment, I felt my heart contract with grief at my loss. I remembered that closeness with my own bondmate, my own DelightsInOrchids. I squashed any sign of my feelings out of my bloodheat.

Since I had already greeted StripeSide, I could greet FirstHuman without impoliteness. <I greet you, FirstHuman.>

<And I greet you, ScarBreast, father of LittleOrchid,> he replied. <We did not expect to see you tonight.>

<Something happened tonight. There has been a human death.>

<Human death?>

<Actually, two deaths, and a theft.>

I filled them both in, quickly telling them about the two deaths – one killed by a human, one by a dinosaur. I saw the shock flooding through StripeSide’s bloodheat. Her face cooled with dismay. 

<The InterSpecies Treaty forbids the killing of humans!> StripeSide hissed as she signed. <This is an act of war!>

FirstHuman moved, as if he wanted to sign, and thought better of it. 

StripeSide must have read something in his bloodheat that I did not. She turned to face him and signed, <You need not say it! I agree!>

<This places the whole Treaty at risk,> he said. <Who would be so foolish?>

The human’s fear of us is – let’s be honest – _entirely_ rational. We are apex predators. Our kind eats their kind, and they know it, but they trust us because we are rational beings and we have signed the Treaty. In return, we trust them not to use their technology against us, because they too have signed the Treaty. We have teeth, and they have guns. The Treaty protects both our species. 

<But there is worse this night,> I signed. 

<Worse than breaking the InterSpecies Treaty?>

<Much worse! The death is connected to InGen.>

I saw StripeSide’s anger flash through her blood. 

“InGen!” she hissed, forgetting to sign. “What mischief are they up to now?” 

FirstHuman sensed her stress, because he turned to her face and rested his hand against the side of her jaw. I saw her take a hold of her bloodheat, and reign in her emotions. _Easssy Blue…_ he murmured to her. 

I do understand, actually. StripeSide does not trust BloodWeavers. She was raised in a cage. No matter how far she goes, she will never truly leave the cage behind her. 

<The mischief is not theirs,> I admitted. <They have asked the Capturers for help. They have lost a sample of the Influence.>

<The Influence!>

<And it is a strain of the disease that can possibly infect us. One of their BloodWeavers stole it, and disappeared with it. We know not where, or why…>

<Why would anyone steal the Influence?> she asked. 

<Not for any good reason!> FirstHuman said. <That we may be sure of!>

<Find it!> she ordered. <Find the Influence, and destroy it!>

<I will,> I said. <And I will inform you of whatever happens. This concerns all of us. As soon as I know what is going on, you will too.>

* * *

I trotted out, glad to have informed StripeSide.

If the Influence is out there, then we need to be forewarned. The first time the Influence came, it came without warning and burned like a fire through the whole Pack before anyone thought about quarantines. The only way to stop the Influence is to put immediate distance between yourself and others, to break the cycle of infection. 

On the way to the gate, I passed a heated lump on the grass. Another Real Person lay there. "Hello there!” a clear voice echoed from the dark. 

I paused. “WingWatch! How do you fare this night?” 

“Very well. I would have joined you in your game with my sister, but observe, I suffer grievously with a severe case of Human Paralysis.”

She _was,_ too. I trotted closer. Her bond-mate SingsAlone slumped across her side, fast asleep. His head was pillowed on his arms, and his arms were folded on her back. 

“I fear this may be a life-long case,” she said. “Observe, I cannot get up. Truly a most grievous case of Human Paralysis.”

I like WingWatch. She has as deep a fascination with human culture as I do, but different. While I am drawn to the shadows of their nature, she is drawn to their understanding of beauty and feeling. Perhaps, WingWatch says, the true meeting between our species is not intelligence, but Art? Art may not be _necessary_ for intelligent life, she says, but it certainly makes intelligent life meaningful, and what use is intelligence without meaning? If you understand what someone else finds beautiful, you already understand a great deal about them.

“How is your little one?” she asked.

“She is well,” I said, but a flutter of concern brushed over my bloodheat. 

“What is wrong?”

“Oh, raising a child is difficult! I worry, always!” 

“She is Pack,” WingWatch said, simply. “You must bring her here, tomorrow.” 

“I always do,” I said. 

I was interrupted by a distant sound that I recognised. In the silent night it was as sharp as a shot. I jerked my head around, in time to see the bloodheat of a human moving fast beyond a line of trees. Whoever it was, she’d seen me jerk around at the sound of the shutter, and she was bolting away. 

“Did you see that?” I snapped. 

“Just a human taking pictures,” WingWatch said. “She was there yesterday too.”

“A human, taking pictures!” I snapped. “Come! We hunt!” 

I jumped over SingsAlone and sprinted after the human. 

But the human had too much of a head start. She was already near the gate and running. I tore after her. 

“You stop right there!” I shouted.

Obviously she just kept running!

I jumped a hedge, and dashed out through the gate just in time to run face-first into the gate itself. I bounced off the iron painfully, grappling with it and throwing it aside. By the time I got to the road, she was already in a car, and the car was already accelerating away, and she was gone. 

I ran after the vehicle, hammering down the hard street, but it was too fast. 

And even if I caught it, what would I do? Break the glass with my head? Pull her out of the vehicle with my talons? Try to arrest her with my killing claws? You see the problem with being a large predator _and_ a Capturer? If _you_ have to subdue and restrain a suspect, you can arrest them without accidentally ripping your suspect to pieces! 

I stopped, and watched the car depart. 

“What was that?” WingWatch said, right behind me. 

She skidded to a stop and stared to where the vehicle had disappeared. Her neck snaked from side to side with wary excitement. 

“Someone is taking pictures.” 

“She was taking pictures of _us?”_

“I do not know. I mistrust this!”

“You mistrust everything,” she snapped at my neck affectionately. 

“With good reason,” I snapped my teeth back at her. “It is my job!”

“Now that you mention it, there was someone taking pictures of SingsAlone today,” she said. “He said he saw someone taking pictures of him, when he went walking in the City with the female he has been courting.” 

Taking pictures of SingsAlone? Why SingsAlone? He is not FirstHuman, who is the bond-mate of the Alpha of Alphas. Admittedly, everyone likes him, but why take pictures of him? Then again, why take pictures of the Disposables? 

Behind us, SingsAlone was running out of the park toward us, his breath puffing. _Waitformeeeee!_

I snapped my teeth at WingWatch. 

“Go back to your sister!” I said to her. “There is something coming, I can feel it.

“Why? What is happening?” 

“Dark things are walking in the City this night. Be warned! And keep SingsAlone by you!”

* * *

I know that if I am careful, the Capturers will never know that I detoured to report to StripeSide. I went next to see the human known as GoodButStrong. 

You can look up GoodButStrong on your screen-toy. You can look up your screen-toy the work he does for the Disposables, and those in danger of becoming Disposables. He founded a group called Let The Children Live, and he does good work against impossible odds. 

The building of Let The Children Live was dark and quiet, but someone let me in. I found my own way up to the top floor. There is a house of the Great Invisible Person there, and GoodButStrong spends much time there. It is a nice room. The walls are white, under the sharp pitch of the roof’s rafters. The wood is clear but polished deeply, and the air smells pleasantly of furniture polish and the incense that burns during ceremonies. Golden wood and gleaming white and incense makes a pleasant place.

Even at this hour of the morning, GoodButStrong was on his knees on the polished wooden floor, speaking to his GreatInvisiblePerson. It was dark beyond the glass windows. 

I was interrupting a quiet private moment, in a quiet private place. I froze into immobility at the back of the room, waiting. He must have heard me, though, because he got up and came to me.

<I greet you,> I signed, and bowed low to him. 

<ScarBreast,> he signed, and bowed back. <I greet you.>

He speaks Human Sign. Since the Disposables figured out that very few adults spoke Human Sign, the language swept through the streets. That means that everyone who wants to work with the Disposables also must learn Human Sign. 

GoodButStrong sat down on one of the long wooden benches. I paced before him, and I spoke to him, and told him of MarkOfGold’s death. 

<I remember MarkOfGold well,> he said. 

<He was a victory,> I said. 

<We _thought_ he was a victory.>

<I am sorry,> I signed. <I truly thought we had saved that one.>

<Man chooses, but God decides,> he signed, his gaze on the cross at the front of the room. 

I decided to let the accidental lapse pass. Many humans still say ‘Man’ when they mean to say ‘People,’ but I knew what he meant. 

<Do you know where he has been lately?> I asked. <I lost track of him, but I heard tonight that you have spoken to him recently.>

<He got a job.>

<And do you know where?>

<Not the details. Not the names. But enough.>

<Does this name mean anything to you?> I asked, and fingerspelled Missing Three-Seven-Two’s name. 

He squinted at me as he compiled the letters in his head. <No. Who is that?>

<A person of interest. Continue to speak?> I snapped my teeth encouragingly. 

<He said they were northerners. They hired him to build incubators. Or rather, to bring incubators, and install them.>

<What sort of incubators?> I asked, although I could guess. 

<The sort of incubators used by chicken farmers.>

<I understand.>

He lowered his eyebrows at me. <MarkOfGold said they were strange. He wasn’t allowed to tell anyone where the incubators were delivered. They acted as if chickens were a secret. What puzzled him was what possible purpose anyone could have for secret chickens? Why chickens?>

I remembered what Shadow had said to us about keeping the eggs warm for two days. 

<They don’t want chickens,> I signed. <They want eggs.>

<I said to him, he should just ask. He said he didn’t think that was safe. But he said he was going to snoop around anyway. They had a screen-toy, and he saw the password.>

That sounded like MarkOfGold, I thought. 

<What did he find?>

<I know not. He did not return.>

<How long ago was this?>

<Monday. No… Tuesday?>

Today was Friday, I thought. Or rather, Saturday morning. I strode back and forth across the high place of the House of the Great Invisible Person, thinking. 

MarkOfGold must have broken into the screen-toy after all. And then he got caught, and they killed him for it. Because what is more expendable than a Disposable teenager, in a city full of other Disposables teenagers? 

<I know where the warehouse was,> GoodButStrong signed. <It is on the west side of the river, up the hill.>

I stopped pacing and stared at him. < Why did you not say?>

<I did not know it was so important. MarkOfGold mentioned bumping his vehicle against a corner when he was getting up there. The place is up in the narrow streets.>

Still a huge area. It would take days to search it, if we went block-by-block. We needed more. 

<I thank you,> I signed. 

<I thank you,> GoodButStrong corrected me gently. He reached out and touched my back briefly; a grave imposition from most humans, but not from this old friend. <Find out who did this?>

<I will,> I promised. 


	4. Chapter 4

I went back through the streets, trotting slowly to the Capturers’ station. I met RedBrick, sitting at our desk with the Translator on a charging cable. RedBrick finished a call, and swung his seat around to face me. 

<Do not achieve comfort in your position!> he said. 

<Why not?> I said. 

<The Uniforms have found the identity of the Alleyway Victim. We know his name and his address!>

<You are not following up?>

<I was waiting for you to come with me.> He grabbed the keys to the vehicle. 

<It is that sort of neighbourhood?> I asked. 

<It _is_ that sort of neighbourhood!>

I hissed. <So be it.>

* * *

At this hour of the morning, the streets were quiet and empty. We made good time across the City, away from the river and into the outskirts, away from the glitz and lights of the City centre. We climbed up to the hillside, into the teeming alleyways and rickety homes where the poor of the City are packed in together. 

RedBrick turned off the car and locked it, and we walked up a narrow winding street. 

And in case you are wondering – most Capturers do not walk brazenly into areas like this at this hour. RedBrick walks through the worst parts of the City unscathed, because RedBrick walks with me.

I know this area well. The Disposables come from places like this. Their choice is to exchange brutality and poverty at home, for brutality and poverty on the streets that at least offer freedom. The block in which AlleyWay Victim had lived had peeling walls, stained concrete, and a strong smell of urine on every corner. 

The house that faced the street was owned by someone else. RedBrick went up and knocked firmly on the door. 

A minute later, the light inside came on. The keeper of the lair opened the door, smelling of unbrushed teeth, and half-asleep. He took one look at me and tried to slam the door in our faces. 

But RedBrick jammed his foot in the door. He started talking fast, and kept talking. I heard the word _Policia_ in the stream of his words, which means Capturer, but the lair keeper was afraid. He was very reluctant to come out from behind the door. His eyes kept drifting from RedBrick to me, over RedBrick’s shoulder. 

I gave him a reassuring smile, in an attempt to set him at his ease. 

The keeper jerked. 

Without looking around RedBrick signed, <Please stop doing that!>

“Oh, very well.” I let my lips drop around the smile.

It took a lot more talking before the keeper agreed to come out from behind the door, and let us into the backyard of his house. He led us through a side gate, glancing over his shoulder at me warily. We went around the back, crunching over broken concrete and ducking under washing-lines. 

The keeper opened the door of the minor-house for us, and then scooted out of sight as soon as his duty was done. 

<Anxiety is his,> I observed.

RedBrick pulled his gloves on, before signing.

<He says the man who stays here lives alone. He has a nasty temper, and they all stay away from him. >

<Not a nice man.>

<No. It sounds as if they will not miss him. Also, he threatened a neighbor with scissors.>

<Scissors?> That didn’t sound very threatening. I have teeth that are bigger than scissors. 

_< Big_ scissors.> He sketched the size of the scissors with his index fingers. 

<Lawn shears,> I guessed. <For the cutting of grass.>

RedBrick scrunched his eyebrows together. <Why does your species have a sign for _lawn shears? >_

I didn’t answer, just pushed the door open with my snout. 

RedBrick laughed quietly. He turned on the lights, and we looked around. 

It was only two rooms, food-room and living-sleeping room. This was the second human home I had visited in one night, but this one was not the same at all. The place was dirty, and airless. It smelled of sweat and unwashed clothes, with base notes of unwashed dishes, and top notes of mothballs.

I heard RedBrick say, “Ugh,” under his breath, which meant he smelled it too. He pulled on his rubber gloves.

I followed him. This was not the home of a family man. Cardboard boxes lined the walls in the living room, never unpacked. The cheap curtains were pulled closed over the windows, trapping the heavy air inside. Cartons of beer stood next to the moving-picture screen – beer undrunk, never to be drunk now. 

Now that I was here I was curious, but also repelled. I recognised the dead man’s smell, of course. I never forget a scent. But this man had only been a scent before. Now he was a person, with a name, and a home … even if it was a repulsive home. 

<Not a nice man,> I signed.

<Do you smell anything here?> RedBrick signed. 

<Nothing you would wish to share.>

<Any trace of Missing Three-Seven-Two?>

<No.>

<Any trace of MarkOfGold?>

<No other human has drawn breath within these walls for many weeks.>

I opened the frozen-food-box, and shut it again very quickly. RedBrick went into the bedroom. He opened and closed the drawers, and then opened the long cupboard. I heard him make a surprised noise.

I went in after him, pushing my nose forward to see. 

<Women’s clothes,> he signed. He reached in and pulled out a slip of pink fabric. <Quite a lot of women’s clothes! A girlfriend?>

I did not answer, I just turned and stared at the dirty laundry on the floor, and the bed that smelled of human seed. 

<Then maybe he wore these himself?> RedBrick held the pink thing against his own chest. 

He raised his eyebrows at me over the hanger, and made an enquiring humming noise. 

<I do not think your wife would approve,> I signed.

He bared his teeth. <Was that a joke?>

<I do not joke.>

RedBrick grunt-laughed. He put the pink thing back. <Did he wear these himself?>

<No. They smell like women. But all different women.> I did not even need to stick my snout closer to know _that._

He brought his brows down. <Weird.>

<RedBrick, I believe these are trophies.>

<Trophies?>

<Memorabilia of a successful hunt. Some humans like to preserve horns from their hunts.>

<I know what trophies are.> He pushed the door back to where it had been. <So, he was really not a nice person.>

<I believe he was not.>

A few minutes later, RedBrick found a distant-caller, and a screen-toy, which he collected and put into plastic. 

<Strange that he left this behind,> he said. 

<He left behind also his keys, and his identity cards,> I observed. 

<What was he doing in that alleyway tonight? Surely he was not visiting the drinking place?>

<He was behind the drinking place, not inside it. And all his money is here.>

<What else do you smell? Any trace of MarkOfGold. Or Missing Three-Seven-Two?>

<No. No other human at all, within the last few months.>

<And dinosaurs?>

<I smell only myself.>

<There must be a connection,> he said. <Two dinosaur-related crimes in one night? That’s too much of a coincidence. They must be connected somehow.>

Capturers don’t like coincidences. I could see him fall into the fallacy, but I did not stop him. I knew he would work it out eventually, but for now I did not break his train of thought. 

<Let the Uniforms come here. They may yet find a connection.> I snaked my neck from side to side, and forced myself to stop. <But not now. We should park this case for now. Stopping the Influence is our priority.>

<Agreed, ScarBreast,> RedBrick said. <The two bodies are already with the Speaker for the Dead. We will see what she says. Perhaps she can find some connection.>

<Come away. The stink of this place disturbs me.>

* * *

We went back to the Station. RedBrick pulled the vehicle into the parking lot, and I got out. 

I became aware of a small movement in the darkness. A familiar scent struck me – cheap perfume and rancid face-paint. I looked around to see where it came from. 

On the road outside the stationary place, I spotted a small movement in the shadows, just outside the street lighting. A small figure, pressed unobtrusively away, waiting but also hiding from the Capturers. 

I drew myself erect and stared into the darkness, snarling so that she knew I’d seen her. 

<A friend is here,> I signed to RedBrick, and leaped across the yard. 

The sliding gate had already closed itself across the road. I jumped the fence, and landed on all fours on the road. She flinched at my speed, but didn’t bolt. 

I had almost forgotten that I asked the Disposables to bring me a camera. I skidded to a stop before her, and snarled at her. 

<Little one,> I said. 

She had indeed found a camera. It had a long heavy lens, and she raised it in both hands toward my teeth. 

<That was quick!> I signed. <Where did you get it?>

<Someone else stole it, so I bought it from him.>

RedBrick couldn’t jump fences, so he had to let himself out through the gate. He arrived by my side a moment later. 

<What is this?> RedBrick signed, and asked the girl in their own language. 

<People are taking pictures of the Disposables. And of SingsAlone.>

<Why take pictures of SingsAlone?>

<That, I do not know,> I admitted. 

<Connected to our case?>

<I think not. But I do not like coincidences. On this night of all nights people are taking pictures of SingsAlone? And Disposables? There is a strange story here.>

<I do not like coincidences either.> He took the camera from the girl.

<You should look at the pictures on it,> she said. <You should look _now. >_

<Not now,> I signed. <Have you found SmallNeedle?>

<No. And two more kids are missing tonight.>

Two more kids? Four kids altogether? I had to find Missing Two-Seven-Three, but I also had a strong urge to drop everything and protect the very small. But I had a duty to do. 

< I am very busy this night with a more important case that involves murder and dinosaurs, but I will see to it that you get your money!>

She nodded, but she was already backing away from RedBrick warily.

<You should look at it, right away!> she signed, and then she was gone. 

She trusted me, since I am a dinosaur, and I have never yet failed to pay for my information, but she didn’t trust RedBrick. 

<Come, let us go,> I said to RedBrick.

<What should we do with this?> he asked. 

<Have a Uniform download the pictures upon it, we will have to come back to it after we have found Missing Two-Seven-Three.>

<Agreed.>

RedBrick and I went inside the Station. 

We both decided it was time to report to the Blue Alpha.

We spoke in the main office, with the two humans leaning against the desks, and I stalked in a circle around them. The Translator had had time to charge while RedBrick dealt with the forensic team, which meant I could report directly and not through RedBrick. 

“Where are the bodies?” the Blue Alpha asked. 

“The bodies have both been moved into the Laboratory already,” RedBrick said. “The Speaker for the Dead will be up here soon, with her first findings. With a bit of luck she can find MarkOfGold’s real name.” 

“What did you find?” Blue Alpha asked me, through the Translator. 

“I found my group of Disposables. And they directed me to GoodButStrong. From Let The Children Live.”

I told them both quickly about what GoodButStrong told me. I told him about the missing Disposables, and the strange picture-takers. I told him about MarkOfGold’s mysterious job, and the chicken incubators. I omitted my visit to StripeSide, of course. That was dinosaur business, and if I was careful the Capturers would never know I had seen her. 

“And you?”

“The Uniforms have been going through Missing Three-Seven-Two’s home,” RedBrick said. “They’re bringing every file and every screen-toy with them. He left in a hurry, and left his desk screen-toy behind. He deleted everything on his work screen-toy, but maybe his home screen-toy will assist us. We can retrieve the files.” 

“Has he not been seen?” I asked. 

“No,” RedBrick said. “He has not appeared on any of the street picture-takers. And he used no credit cards, he passed no police stops, he made no purchases.” 

“He has disappeared,” the Alpha said, rubbing his face. “Hiding, or kidnapped?” 

“Hiding,” RedBrick said. “He stole those eggs. That much we do know.” 

“He is lying low.” I leaned my jawbone on the edge of my own screen-toy. 

“Or he has already left the City, and taken the eggs with him?” RedBrick suggested. 

I raised my head again, and tapped my killing-claws thoughtfully. 

“I don’t think he will leave the City,” I said. “He won’t want to break the eggs – and worse, changes in temperature will kill the embryos.”

“You think he’ll lie low until the eggs are ready to be extracted?” the Alpha asked. 

“That is what I think,” I agreed. “He will stay where-ever the incubator is.”

“And our first victim,” the Alpha asked. “Nobody heard anything when the Alleyway Victim was killed?” 

RedBrick shook his head. “Nothing. The Uniforms asked around in the area. Nobody heard anything.” 

That did not actually mean nobody heard. People in the City of Eternal Spring often do not hear. It makes sense, if you think about it from the point of view of a prey species. Why get involved in someone else’s trouble, and put yourself in harm’s way? The dead are already dead, aren’t they? And the criminals always have friends. So people hear nothing. 

“Keep me up to date,” the Alpha said. “Anything that involves dinosaurs is news.” 

RedBrick’s eyes focused on something over my back. He didn’t sign, just jerked his chin to something behind me, to tell me something was happening. 

I turned, hissing and lowering my throat lest I was facing a sudden threat. 

The Speaker for the Dead arrived. 

She must have come straight from the place of the dead, because the smell of embalming fluid was still on her. She looked exhausted. The sun was rising soon, but I think she had not slept at all. She leaned forward against the table, speaking into the Translator that stood in the centre of the table. 

“I have been looking at our two murder victims,” she said through the Translator. “You were right, ScarBreast.”

<Clarify?> I signed, blinking my nictitating membrane. 

She brought out some glossy photographs, and put them on the desk between us all. I looked down at the dead faces; one much more discoloured han the other. 

“This man was killed by a dinosaur.” She tapped one picture. “But this man definitely was not. He was stabbed.”

“Then what happened?” RedBrick asked. 

“Someone tried to make it _look_ like a dinosaur killed him. They stabbed him, and then made the hole in his chest after he died. And his body was moved. He died elsewhere, and was moved later.” 

Poor MarkOfGold, I thought. 

“And the other one?” I spoke carefully into the Translator, and listened to my words translated into human song. 

She reshuffled her photographs. 

“Ah, this one. This was one definitely killed by a dinosaur. My first examination indicates that the wound matches the shape and size of a Real Person’s killing-claw. A killing kick. Messy.” 

I saw RedBrick wince. “We saw.” 

“But I do not think we will find anything else,” she said. “Whoever did this was careful. Exactly two hits, and then whoever it was left and didn’t come back. Just left him to die.”

“DNA evidence?” 

“Nothing at all,” she said, and frowned at me. “Just _this_ idiot’s dander all over the place!” 

“I thought I could pick up a trace scent of the killer!” I protested. 

“And did you?”

“No.” 

“And now thanks to you, the only DNA we can pick up from the scene is _yours!”_

I leaned forward into the Translator, ready with an apology and an explanation, but I was interrupted. 

There was a crash at the door! One of the Uniforms rushed in.

He started out speaking rapidly to RedBrick, too fast for the Translator to follow. Whatever he said was very exciting to the other Capturers in my pack. They were jumping up from their chairs, and coming over, buzzing like bees. 

Uniform set his screen-toy down and swivelled it around to face us all. 

It took a moment for the Translator to pick out his words. “We just started going through his home. It looks like he was translating these into our language… ”

I shoved one of the junior uniforms out of the way, and crouched to see the screen. The helpful Uniform turned the screen slightly, so that I could see. 

My eyes focused on a printed page, with writing across it in large letters.

HUMANS FIRST! 

GOD, AND MY RIGHT! Screamed the next caption. And the next, and the next, and the next. 

DEFEND YOUR SPECIES!

YOUR CHILDREN WILL BE PREY! 

GENESIS 1:26! 

Johnson Rocher DESTROYS dinosaur supporter with LOGIC and REASON!

Avocado KILLS dinosaurs! GET READY TO DEFEND YOUR SPECIES! 

The words were superimposed onto pictures of dinosaurs. Dinosaurs screaming, dinosaurs snarling. I saw pictures taken from the Island of Clouds, and pictures from the Last Battle. Dinosaurs like me, snarling and snapping – and advice on how to fight us, how to kill us, how we needed to be exterminated. 

I felt the horror ripply through my bloodheat.

The Uniform went on flicking through the pictures, but I had seen enough!

The other Capturers were jabbering excitedly and skimming through the pictures rapidly, exclaiming and reading aloud, and none of them looked at me. I backed away from the excited crowd forming around the screentoy. 

I knew there were humans who hate dinosaurs, but I had never met any myself. I knew they were out there, but I had never been touched by them myself. It felt bad. I wanted to scream back at the headlines, and argue back, and defend myself from their hatred – but there was no-one here to argue with. And even if there was, there was nothing I could say in the face of such unblinking hate. Anything I said would only inflame them to hate me more. Hate upon hate. 

I felt a hot tight strain, deep inside my chest, radiating out through my skin, fizzing. The humans were clustering too close, bumping my sides. I could feel the walls closing in around me, and suddenly I felt as if I could not breathe. I backed away from the humans, shuddering my jaw. 

RedBrick looked up and met my gaze. I tilted my head sideways. 

<I need to get out of this room,> I signed to him. <I need to go outside!>

The Blue Alpha clapped his hands, and raised his voice, and the chatter of human singing voices dropped.

He spoke so loudly the Translator picked him up across the room. 

“Nothing has changed!” he snapped. “We knew he had something dangerous! Now we know what he wants to do with it! You!” He turned to one of the Uniforms. “Go and get Shadow in here, we need to know more about this stuff!”

“Yes, Alpha!” 

“The rest of you!” The Blue Alpha raised his voice and turned around to face the rest of the room. 

“Call the morning shift in early. All other cases can wait – this case is our absolute priority! We have an active terrorist threat!”

<I need to get out of here,> I signed. 

<Come on, my friend,> RedBrick signed. <I will go with you.>

We made our way out through the narrow grey corridors, and through the metal-detectors, and through the security gates, winding our way through the maze of steel. After a moment, we were outside in the dark, in the parking place of the vehicles. Getting out was like breaking out of a locked safe. 

The lights of the City were like an orange glow under the rainclouds above, but a strip of grey was already shining in the east. I leaned my flank against the side of a vehicle, and bent low so that my forehands rested on the gravel. Then, slowly, I let my legs double-up under me.

The cold gravel bit into my belly; a welcome bite. The air was wet and cold, and very welcome. I breathed deeply, in and out. 

I heard the strike of a flame-flicker, and the scent of smoke. I opened my eyes. 

RedBrick had lit a smoke-paper. <I am sorry you saw that,> he signed, letting the smoke dangle from his lips. 

I pushed myself back to my feet again. 

<So am I,> I signed. 

<Do you think Doctor Shade knows about Humans First?> he asked. 

<That, I doubt. But I believe StripeSide will probably blame him anyway.>

RedBrick inhaled deeply on his smoke. 

>Forensics is going to have fun!>

<We do not have time for Forensics to have fun,> I signed unhappily. <Missing Three-Seven-Two did not bother taking his work with him.>

<Not a good sign.>

<No,> I said. <Not a good sign at all. He thinks it is too late for us to stop him. Whatever his plan is, it is happening now.>


	5. Chapter 5

Things moved fast, after that. 

Other Capturer departments were notified that we had a credible threat of a terror attack. GAULA was notified. The City’s human governance were warned. Forensics moved in. They were unpacking _everything_ from the home of Missing Three-Seven-Two, but gladly the horrible posters had been covered over. Capturers were buzzing in and out. Some of them had been called up from home early, even though they do not start their work for hours.

It was quite awkward for me. In a way, I was the centre of all that activity. Missing Three-Seven-Two was aiming to attack People like me, and I did not know exactly how I was supposed to respond. Pretend I was just another Capturer? Recuse myself from the case? Take leadership over the case? There is no Standard Operating Procedure for this. I could feel their eyes on me, and I did not like it. 

If I thought things were awkward before, they were twice as awkward when Dr Shadow arrived, ushered in by a Uniform.

In these surroundings, Dr Shadow looked smaller than he did in his own workplace. It was as if he was overshadowed by the hard toughness of the Blue Pack. Or perhaps it was just exhaustion making him seem smaller. He had clearly not slept. His eyes were rimmed with red, and his beard was showing. 

_DoctorSheppard!_ RedBrick greeted him. 

<I wish that I had good news,> he signed. 

<You may speak your own language,> I signed. <We have the Translator.>

RedBrick brought it over and switched it on. 

Shadow spoke carefully. "I wish that I had good news for you," he said. 

"It is bad?" I asked.

"We found the results from the tests that Missing Three-Seven-Two ran. He tried to hide them, and it took time to find them. This strain of the Influence killed cell cultures in the glass-house. It will definitely infect you too."

"The humans who caught it - they survived?"

"They just got a runny nose. But the chickens died in their thousands. And if it killed the chickens so fast ..."

"We are basically large birds,” I said, “Frog DNA notwithstanding, we are more closely related to chickens than we are to you."

Shadow gripped at his hair. "I wish I had good news. I really wish I had good news!"

“What about a vaccine?” I asked. “There are vaccines for the Influence. SisterOfOrchids gets one every year.”

“I would need blood defences from a survivor, first,” he said.

“Someone has to get sick, in order to have a vaccine?” I asked. 

“In short, yes. And unfortunately vaccines take a long time to prepare.” 

“And the disease in the wild? On the farm?”

“We think we have it contained, through culling,” he said. “We don’t think it has escaped from the quarantine zone.”

“But it _has_ escaped from the quarantine zone,” RedBrick said, and his bloodheat was low and sombre. “It has escaped, and Humans First has it.” 

"I would never have hired him if I had known he was involved with Humans First!" Dr Shadow said, looking at me. 

“Humans First have never been involved in violence before,” I said. “They have done nothing but rant on the Between-Screens. This is new.” 

“They have moved beyond ranting, now. They killed MarkOfGold,” RedBrick said. 

"What about the other victim? The AlleyWay victim?"

"There is no connection between the two cases," I said. 

“No connection,” RedBrick said. “We know for sure that a dinosaur killed him. But which dinosaur killed him, we have no idea. And we have no idea what he was doing there in that alley.”

“A bad man met a bad dinosaur down a dark alley,” I said. 

"There must be a connection between the two?" Shadow said. "It's too much of a coincidence."

"There is a connection," I said. "A dinosaur killed the Alleyway man. And Missing Three-Seven-Two is trying to kill dinosaurs. Simply the fact that we dinosaurs _exist_ in this city _is_ the connection." 

RedBrick ran his hands over his face; unwittingly signing the word <Beard.>

“We have a group out there with the Influence, and plans to use it that we do not know. What is their plan?”

“They will need a place to work with the eggs,” Shadow said. “They will need a second laboratory, a place to work with the virus samples. Equipment, tools, sustained power, a cold-store… glass-ware… an incubator…”

I looked at Shadow. “How long do we have until Missing Three-Seven-Two can harvest his eggs?”

“A few hours. He will have enough virus particles in the eggs to harvest by later this morning.”

“Then we have a few more hours to stop him.”

I couldn't help myself; I turned and looked toward the door. In here there were no windows, but I could see the sunrise in my mind's eye. It would have risen by now. 

“There is something else,” Shadow said. “Missing Three-Seven-Two had time to inject only six eggs. For enough Influence to infect the City, Humans First would need far more than just six eggs.”

“They did not intend to move so soon,” I guessed. “They were interrupted.” 

“I know what interrupted them,” RedBrick said. 

“I do too,” I agreed. “MarkOfGold found out what they were planning. He probably tried to stop them. And they killed him for it. But they don’t know who he might have talked to.”

“Which is why Missing Three-Seven-Two left before he could inject more than six eggs!” Shadow said. 

“The timing matches up,” I agreed. "I suspect that when we find Humans First, and search their second location, we will find signs that MarkOfGold was killed there. Killed, and then moved, and the scene staged in an attempt to throw us off the trail."

Poor MarkOfGold! Just another poor youth on the street, scrabbling for money. He had avoided being picked up by gangs, militias, vigilantes all his life – and it had done him no good in the end. They must have hired him up as a local fixer, trusting that he would ask no questions. They could never have guessed that he owed a debt of gratitude to a dinosaur. MarkOfGold would not have kept quiet, once he found out their insane plans. 

I moved to the map pinned to the wall. “MarkOfGold was hired to install an egg incubator, somewhere in this area.” I stood up to my full height, and outlined the area on the map with my talon. The end of my talon was a sharp black hook against the white paper. “We know this, because he told GoodButStrong so. The second location will be in this area.” 

“But that is still a huge area to search,” RedBrick said. He folded his arms and rested his back against his desk. “Even _you_ cannot search that whole area in one morning.”

“I will have to give it an attempt,” I said, staring up at the map. “Particularly if I work with Special Weapons and Tactics, and GAULA.”

“What of the Alleyway Victim?” RedBrick said. “We have his portable screen-toy. We can triangulate his movements with MarkOfGold’s, and see if they cross paths.” 

“A good idea,” I said, diplomatically. 

I spoke too soon. 

There was an echoing crash, elsewhere in the building. I heard a shriek of rage from outside the Capturer’s station, audible through the walls. Then I heard WingWatch’s bellow outside, raised in operatic outrage. 

**“HOW DARE THEY! HOW DARE THEY TOUCH YOU! YOU, OF ALL PEOPLE! I am going to kill them all, I am going to rip them into a thousand tiny pieces, and then feed them to pigeons! Where is my dumb sister! STRIPE-SIDE!”**

She was giving her voice all she had. It was an aria of rage, an onslaught of vocal power. It was magnificent - from a distance. 

RedBrick and Shadow looked at each other, and RedBrick said, _Uh-oh…_

“She sounds vexed.” I said. 

She was vexed all right. WingWatch launched herself through the door, as if heralded by her own theme music. SingsAlone was with her, but instead of following at her side as usual he was being pushed bodily in front of her by her nose. StripeSide and FirstHuman arrived close on her tail. Suddenly the open working-space was too small, with three Real People in it, and one of those three almost _boiling_ with fury. 

<Here comes trouble…> FirstHuman signed as he spotted Shadow. 

StripeSide saw Shadow, and snapped irritably at the sight of him. <You! What are you doing here?>

She took a half-step toward him, and I think she would have continued, but FirstHuman was too quick. He threw out a hand quick as a flash across her nose, blocking her path and stopping her rant. <Attend!> he snapped the sign off with one hand. 

WingWatch spotted me, and her voice ramped up. 

**_"THEY TRIED TO STEAL MY HUMAN!”_ ** she roared at me. 

The Translator died with a little electronic whimper.

“Who?” I asked. 

“How the copulating chickens should I know _who?”_ WingWatch said. 

“What happened?” 

“They tried to grab him on his way to purchase caffeine! They tried to grab him with a bag over his head, and push him into a vehicle, but I was there, and I gave chase, and they drove off!”

There had been a parallel conversation going on through this exchange, as SingsAlone explained loudly to RedBrick, Shadow and the rest of the Capturers what had happened, and why WingWatch was so angry. 

<They are stealing bond-mates! Stealing bond-mates!> WingWatch dropped her head low and screamed – a pure howl of rage, with all her teeth bared. Her talons clutched at the air. 

SingsAlone turned to her. <My dove!>

She whirled on him and snapped her teeth. <Do not _dove_ me!>

<I’m not hurt!> he signed. 

<You could have been stolen! Nobody steals you! You’re mine! MINE!>

She spun back to me. <You! You're the Dinosaur Detective! Go away and _detect_ something!>

I cast my gaze over SingsAlone. His eye-glasses were cracked, I saw. His shirt was torn over the sleeve. He smelled of spilled coffee. He had fought back, I guessed, and he’d been successful, and he had managed to get away. But he was not a fighting human. He was an artist, and a poet, and a Namer of power, but none of those things were very martial. 

_Amateur kidnappers,_ I thought, certainly not professionals. Trust me, I know the difference. If the professionals want to kidnap a person off a street corner, they will – quickly, smoothly, and silently. Definitely amateurs. 

But they had also chosen a moment when SingsAlone was alone – during WingWatch’s first sleep. That meant that they had been watching for a while. 

_Amateurs,_ I thought, _Watching the movements of dinosaurs,_ and suddenly the floor seemed to drop out from under me, as if I was a hatchling falling again down a deep black hole. 

I leaped up onto my own desk, scattering papers and coffee-mugs. i caught myself up there, snaking my head from side to side. <RedBrick. The camera I brought in – where is it?>

RedBrick stared up at me, and his eyes went out of focus. I knew the expression of a human struggling to change gears. <It is in the other office.>

<Bring it here!>

<Why now?>

<Just bring it! We should see who is on it!>

<Another hunch?> RedBrick asked, but he was already moving. He disappeared into the Charge Office. 

<What is this?> StripeSide said, looking from me to RedBrick. 

<I think I know what the plan is…> I signed, so that everyone would understand me. 

<They are stealing bond-mates!> WingWatch snarled. <That is the plan!>

I spun around on top of my desk, my tail whipping, and screamed at her. <They are not planning to poison _us_ with the Influence! They’re planning to poison our bond-mates!>

<What?> FirstHuman signed, and the blood drained clean out of his face. 

<They have not got enough of the Influence to poison all of us! They have only six eggs. Not enough for every dinosaur in the City! Not even close!>

Redbrick brought the camera, and I did not need to tell him what to do. He opened the side, and brought out the chip, and stuck it into a card-reader attached to his machine. He opened the folder on his screen-toy, and the pictures started to open. He started flicking through the thumbnails. 

I waited for the pictures to open, but I could already see the plot laid out in front of me. I knew I was right. 

I had three cases. Now I had _one_ case. All three were connected, although as yet only I knew how. I looked around me. 

All eyes were on me – I had everyone’s attention. 

<We assumed they have another laboratory!> I declared. <But we were wrong!>

<They _must_ have another laboratory,> Shadow said. <You cannot just whip up a virus in half a day.>

<You don’t _really_ need a lab from live virus samples!> I signed. <All you need is a host…>

Shadow winced, struck by the idea. 

<They are going to steal bond-mates, and infect them with the Influence, and then let our bond-mates run back to us with the Influence!>

<They did not steal FirstHuman,> StripeSide said. 

<They must have thought that SingsAlone was a softer target,> I signed. <They would not have hurt SingsAlone. They would have exposed him to the Influence, and then set him free, and then they would kill StripeSide through him.>

I could see the whole plot, laid out in front of me, clear as day in my mind’s eye. How do you kill a dinosaur? How do you kill StripeSide, in particular? Simple _– you don’t._ You infect the humans she spends all her time with, and you let _them_ do it for you. 

We Real People are rare – but humans are not. Humans are anything _but_ rare! And humans travel back and forth across the world, crossing all the oceans, all the continents! To get rid of the Real People, don’t poison the Real People. Poison the bond-mates instead! Use seven _billion_ humans as your weapons. 

Oh, these humans! They know us too well! They know that our bond-mates are our weakness. That love will lead us to do things we would never otherwise do. Love can lead us to murder. Love may yet destroy us all. 

<And the camera?> StripeSide asked. 

<People have been sneaking around the City, taking pictures of WingWatch, taking pictures of the Disposables. I think it is connected. I think they have been deciding who to steal … who can cause the most damage….>

I felt a hand flapping at my shoulder. It was RedBrick. He was saying _Ruiz-Ruiz-Ruiz-Ruiz._ He had been saying it for a while, but I had not heard him. 

_Ruiz-Ruiz-Ruiz-Ruiz!_ His voice reached a pitch that I could no longer ignore. His eyes were glued to the screen-toy, and all the blood had leached out of his face. 

I hopped off my desk, and bent my head down to look at the screen-toy. And I felt my heart rise up in my throat on a tide of rage. 

I saw myself on the screen. They had not only been taking pictures of SingsAlone. They had been taking pictures of me. I saw myself, and LittleOrchid. 

... LittleOrchid eating ice-cream with me in the park. 

... LittleOrchid with me in the supermarket. 

... LittleOrchid with me, coming out of the learning-place. 

... LittleOrchid riding her two-wheels, with WingWatch close at her side

... LittleOrchid being dropped off at the Library by Sister …

RAGE!

Everything fell together in my head. SingsAlone … SmallNeedle … and LittleOrchid? What do they _all_ have in common? 

_Me._

I shook from snout to tail, my blood running cold inside me. Cold as ice. I saw the whole plot at once, spread out before me. And the realization ran through me like a fever. 

<They are not only attacking StripeSide,> FirstHuman signed. <They are attacking _you._ _You_ are the dinosaur detective. You are as well known in this City as StripeSide is! You go everywhere, speak to everyone, know everyone! If they poisoned _you… > _

<We will send Uniforms to your house, ScarBreast!> RedBrick signed. 

I shuddered my jaws, hearing my throat rumble. <It’s too late! I need to call SisterOfOrchids! Right now!>

<Why?>

<Because my child is going to the Library! And if _other_ children have been stolen…!>

RedBrick grabbed the phone on his desk before I had even finished signing. He dialled my home number from memory. I bent down from my perch on my desk, breathing over his neck as he spoke. I could feel all the muscles in my neck shivering, and my teeth chattering. 

Sister’s voice came on the line, in a tone I have never heard from that tough woman before. The Translator picked it up. 

_“How did you know? It’s only been twenty minutes! We’ve just started looking!”_

“Where?” RedBrick snapped.

_“Right outside the Library! They were so fast, my boys couldn’t stop them!”_

They all heard it. The humans heard Sister’s own voice through the phone. StripeSide and WingWatch heard the Translator. 

I had dropped down another dark hole, but this time I was still falling. My legs collapsed under me, and I had to catch myself on my forehands before I fell off my desk. 

My child. _My child._ Missing. Lost out there in the huge city. And it was my fault, my fault…

“Stop that you dolt!” StripeSide snapped at my neck, her teeth catching in my hide. “We will find her!” 

“StripeSide, they have taken my child! My child!”

“Exactly! _Your_ child! They decided to steal the child that every dinosaur in the Pack knows! They have overplayed their hand! You are not trying to scent-track her alone!”

<You are the Capturers, ScarBreast!> FirstHuman signed. <This is what you do. The stakes are high, but you have got this!>

<This is not just any case,> I signed. 

<This is true. But you have got this. You are the dinosaur detective. There is no-one you cannot find. And you're not alone. We are all behind you!>

I snarled, my jaws shuddering and my teeth bared.

<What about the Alleyway Victim?> FirstHuman signed. <We can trace his screen-toys?>

<Forget the copulating Alleyway Victim!> I snarled. <He's nothing! He's nobody!>

<We can scent-track,> StripeSide suggested. <We all know what she smells like. We can quarter the streets, one block at a time, until we find her!>

<No! If they see dinosaurs on the streets, they will panic and hurt her!>

RedBrick had been staring at the screen-toy, and he jumped to his feet. <We don’t need to quarter the streets! We have got them!>

<What is this?> FirstHuman signed.

<They did not turn off geo-tagging!> RedBrick signed. <We have got them!>

<Clarify!> I snapped. I jumped off the desk. 

RedBrick pointed to the screen-toy. <Observe! The very first picture on the list!>

I crowded around behind him, with WingWatch and StripeSide beside me, and SingsAlone wormed his way between us.

<This is the first picture on the device. Whoever used it took a few pictures, testing out the zoom, and the settings of the camera. Wherever this picture was taken, is the place where they are planning! And they have not turned off the geo-tagging!>

RedBrick opened a file, and opened ‘Properties.’ And there it was: a set of numbers. Geographic co-ordinates!

<We don’t need to quarter the streets! This camera will take us to them!>

<They can’t be that stupid!> WingWatch said. 

<You have no idea how stupid criminals can be!> RedBrick signed. 

<They probably set that deliberately!> I signed. <They have been mapping our movements with those cameras.>

RedBrick was opening a map on the screen-toy. <And here it is!> He pointed at the screen. <We have them!>

He was pointing at a spot on the map. A single street; a single block. 

I inhaled, deeply. "Then that is where I must go." 

StripeSide spun around, snapping her teeth at WingWatch. <Now hear me! LittleOrchid is Pack! This is Pack business! We will find this child!>

She gathered herself onto her hocks and leaped clean over RedBrick’s desk, making Helpful Uniforms squawk and duck out of her way. 

<Come on!> WingWatch signed to me. 

We were right behind her when StripeSide burst out through the metal-detector and into the cool morning light. 

She braced herself proudly on the steps, and cough-barked. Her long neck snaked left, right, left, surveying the street of the City as if she owned it. 

“Hear me, my Pack! My beautiful hunters! Hear me! I am StripeSide! Destroyer of Helicopters! Slayer of Giants! Evil walks this day, and we will seek it out, and we will destroy it!”

At her side, WingWatch thrust her head into the sky, and threw her heart into a call. The Song of the Hunt rang out, pure and rich and uplifting. In spite of myself I felt my blood run hot in my veins, and a shudder of hunting-arousal ran down my hide.

In the distance I heard old SilverNose pick up the call. In the other direction I heard MoonRain and GoldenCycad both raise their voices. “Why do you sing that song, in a human city?”

“We hunt this morning!"

<She will be found, ScarBreast!> FirstHuman promised me. <She _will_ be found!>


	6. Chapter 6

I rode with the SWAT team in their vehicle. I was packed in between them and their equipment. I had to grab at the webbing floor with my claws, as the vehicle suddenly braked hard. We were timing our arrival, the better to achieve surprise. 

The vehicle braked hard, and the door slammed open on its rail. I eeled out and hit the tar running. Behind me, humans in black were pouring out of the vehicle. The other vehicle was pulling up behind ours, and StripeSide, WingWatch and the alpha GoldenCycad were leaping out.

_Go-go-go!_

The Real People may not have SWAT training, but some things we just know. We’d watched SWAT prepare and that was enough. In fact, the only difficulty was preventing the entire Pack from volunteering to join SWAT on the spot. In the end we settled with just four of us. 

_GO-GO-GO!_

WingWatch peeled off to the left with GoldenCycad, running parallel with one column of SWAT. StripeSide peeled off to the right, keeping pace stride for stride with me, and the second column. Another group was arriving on the other side of the building; out of sight. 

I sprinted around a corner. We fetched up under a high wall, the perimeter of the old warehouse. I paused, looking back at them. 

The SWAT team was arriving behind StripeSide ... _one – two – three – four_ … they slammed into place at my side like so many dominoes. They were dressed all in black, impenetrable and anonymous. Cased inside body armour and steel, their bloodheat is unreadable, almost inhuman. 

For a second I saw them the way criminals must see them: tough, inscrutable, dangerous… _My_ pack! 

The Alpha signalled with two fingers. <Proceed!>

One man knelt. He was inserting a camera on a wire to see inside, drilling a tiny hole in a gap in the wall. There was a camera over the front door, and we knew to avoid entering its field of view. But corrugated buildings have holes. Simple: drill a tiny hole and slip a camera inside. He raised one thumb, to signal that he had a good view. 

“We go up,” StripeSide said. I looked at her. Her eyes were focused on the roof. 

“I confirm, we go up!” I signed, <Making height!> so that SWAT knew where we were going. 

The SWAT Alpha signalled _GO GO GO GO!_

We sprinted across across an empty gateway. It was quick to leap to the roof of the neighbouring building. Very easy to use the cantilever there for another long leap onto the target building itself. A second later we were on the roof.

StripeSide poked her nose over the edge, and a grappling hook sailed up right at my side. I grabbed it and snugged in in securely, and the line immediately started wiggling as a human below started climbing.

We were not waiting for them. 

The roof was not flat. It zig-zagged up and down like saw-teeth. The vertical drops had been used for strip windows, allowing natural light to penetrate. 

I moved down the roof toward the nearest windows, careful not to lose my footing on the steep pitch. I could feel grit and corrosion underfoot. I kept low, and moved to the bottom gutter, just below the windows. I moved slowly, unsure of how much my footsteps might echo inside the roof. 

Stripeside moved alongside me. She found a space a few strides from me, keeping her distance. 

I lay down alongside the glass. The window was filthy. I could see nothing inside. 

But I could smell LittleOrchid! 

I gasped. Her scent – cinnamon, and shampoo, and strawberry lip-gloss! It was a whisp of her, but it washed over me like walking into a rainbow. My daughter, my child, my own and only Egg – the greatest and worst gift ever given to me! Her scent hammered a storm of memories into my heart – her first tooth, her first step, her first schoolday…

“She’s here!” StripeSide said. 

“She is!” I confirmed. 

I realized that her scent was rising through the extractor fan, set into the roof behind me and spinning slowly. I lay down on the corrogated roof, and pressed my snout to the dirty glass. But I could see nothing. 

At my side, the humans were also climbing up to the roof. Black-clad men were padding across the roof around StripeSide and me. They were already locking in ropes for their drop into the roof. Multiple ingress-points, the better for a surprise attack. The battering rams were ready to smash the windows in. 

<WAIT,> the leader of the SWAT team said. He pressed his finger to his ear, listening to the teams on the other side of the building. 

_“I have overwatch,”_ MoonRain said, from a distance. She had decided to watch the sniper from another rooftop.

“We are here,” WingWatch announced. She was on the other side of the roof.

Roof, then doors, then windows… that was the plan… a multiple entry attack, overwhelming noise and speed and force. 

“We are all ready,” StripeSide said. 

“Wait,” I warned her. “Wait, until we know what is going on inside.” 

I cannot spit. So instead I brought up a small amount of stomach juice onto the glass, and then smeared it into the glass with the end of my snout. The dirt was stubborn. I smeared a tiny rheumy circle into the grimy glass, just enough, and then turned my head sideways and set my eye against the glass.

It took a moment to know what I was looking down at. 

“Be still, ScarBreast,” StripeSide warned. My bloodheat had betrayed my feelings. 

My line of sight ran down, through a lace of girders and beams. The floor was grey. In the centre was a set of metal fencing, with a block set off from it with scaffolding, curtained with thick plastic. I saw benches and stands. 

And I saw cages. Cages, such as you would find for a dog, but much bigger. And inside the cages, children. I could see them clearly. Small children, in cages. 

“Your Disposables?” StripeSide asked. 

“I know not,” I spoke softly. I couldn't recognise faces from this angle. But they could well be my missing Disposables. 

The humans below were very busy. I heard voices calling. I saw movement inside the plastic sheeting. They were aroused by something. They were about to _do_ something. We had arrived at an opportune time. 

“Three… four… five…” WingWatch was counting the number of enemies below. “Five prey.”

“I concur,” StripeSide agreed.

As I watched, two humans crossed to one of the cages, and unlocked it. They reached in and grabbed one of the caged children. She screamed and hit out, lashing and kicking, screaming human words, and my blood ran cold. I knew that voice!

LittleOrchid!

“Be still, ScarBreast!” StripeSide warned. “The teams must get in position first!”

“LittleOrchid is there!” I snarled. 

LittleOrchid was screaming and kicking, but the adults were too strong. They picked her up bodily off the ground and hauled her over to the plastic sheeting. I saw the one human’s hands on her arm, hard fingers biting into her little arm, _hurting her._ A second later they brushed aside the plastic and dragged her inside the cube. 

I snarled, and my vision swam in red rage. _“Not happening!”_

I didn’t bother with entry procedures! I just jumped! 

I fell in a hailstorm of broken glass and a burst of sunlight, screaming, as gravity gripped me. I rocketed down and the floor came up to meet me. StripeSide shrieked.

I hit the cement with a painful crash on all fours. 

I had caught them by surprise. Two humans stared at me blankly for what seemed like a long second. 

I had taken glass deep into my face and chest, slicing into my hide. I felt the blood start immediately but there was no time to block off the arteries. I stood up and snarled.

Then StripeSide and WingWatch were crashing in after me. The tableau shattered, and SWAT were diving, and the battering rams were crashing, and everything was happening _too_ fast! The humans were running, and I sprang to meet them. 

The nearest human raised a weapon but I was already on him. I didn’t bother biting – I just swung my head like a hammer as if I was disciplining a hatchling. The man caught my snout and went flying. 

The other threw down his weapon, just in time because StripeSide was right behind me. SWAT were on him in an instant, roaring commands, and the human was folding around his knees, down to the cement, down, docile. 

Behind me, more Capturers were pouring in, guns bristling, roaring in on heavy boots. 

But I didn’t wait. The kids were to one side in cages, yelling in shrill voices. Plastic sheeting hung from the scaffolding, forming a cube. I blashed through the plastic sheets. 

Crash!

Steel crashed into my head! 

The human had moved fast – he’d swung something at my face. Something warm and sharp stung my face, slicing around my lips and my eyes. My nictitating membranes blocked the glass and steel, but I twisted my head blindly and bit down instinctively. I clamped my teeth on his arm, steel tray and all, feeling more broken glass and steel inside my mouth, and tasting human blood. With a yank of my head and neck I threw the whole painful mouthful away, tossing the human aside. He shrieked, but I had no attention for him. 

LittleOrchid was in front of me. My vision narrowed on her, and she was all I could see. 

I snarled. 

Missing Three-Seven-Two had my baby in his grip, with his back against the incubator. He was crushing her against him. His weapon was pressed against her flank, muzzle snubbed into her little pink T-shirt. Her eyes were wide. I could see the terror in her bloodheat.

_Papa!_

<Be still, child.> My blood was running down my snout and dripping onto the cement. I must have looked as terrifying as I felt. 

“You,” I said aloud. “Missing Three-Seven-Two. You are under arrest, for the murder of MarkOfGold, the theft of intellectual property, kidnapping, and attempted murder…” 

_Get back!_ Missing Three-Seven-Two hadn’t heard me, of course. He yanked LittleOrchid backward against the egg incubator. 

His eyes were wild with hate. His bloodheat was fiery-hot, rage pumping through him. He was surrounded by SWAT; RedBrick was behind me, and StripeSide, and even FirstHuman. The walls of his stand-off were plastic. He had nowhere to go. He would either surrender, or go down in a blaze of gunfire. 

_You’re surrounded!_ RedBrick hollered. He was at my side now, his weapon levelled. The perfect triangle stance, levelled. 

_I’ll shoot!_

_You’re going to shoot a cop’s kid? You think you’ll survive the drive to jail? Put it down! Down! Down, and you live!_

I couldn’t understand the humans’ words, of course, but I’ve read so many incident reports that I knew the script by heart. 

Missing Three-Seven-Two was clearly looking for an escape route. His eyes rolled left and right, casting desperately as he realized that holding a dinosaur’s child hostage was probably the _least_ safe thing he could do. 

LittleOrchid was shuddering in terror. 

<Be still, child, it is all right.>

His gaze cast left, and lit on the other human, moaning feebly on the floor in growing blood-loss-shock. Missing Three-Seven-Two looked at me, and RedBrick. And back at me, and then at the man on the ground, bleeding and groaning. 

And then, horribly, his face broke into a smile. 

I didn’t understand at first, and then I looked down at the man I had bitten and thrown away. 

He lay among a scattering of medical instruments, steel and glass, and yellow fluid like pus on the cement. Broken glass and yellow fluid was now dripping down my face, stinging painfully inside my mouth, mixing with my blood … 

I realized what I was smelling. The revulsion struck me so hard that I staggered. 

Missing Three-Seven-Two pointed the gun down at the ground, and threw it aside. As soon as the gun was down, SWAT swarmed him, slamming him to the cement. 

LittleOrchid threw herself free and dashed toward me. 

“NO!” I screamed. <Stay back! Touch me not!>

She skidded to a halt, shocked. 

I could feel the glass in my flesh. I could feel the liquid running down my face, running into the wound in my breast, the blood running down my chest. 

<Stay back! Don’t touch me!>

I saw my rejection crash into her bloodheat. RedBrick reached her in the same second. He wrapped both arms around her, throwing warm muscles around her. 

_It’s allright, easythere, easythere, everything’s gonnabeokay…_

She screamed over his shoulder at me. _Papa!_

<It’s all right, baby!>

A second later WingWatch was there, too, coiling herself urgently around both humans, wrapping LittleOrchid in reassurance. I saw LittleOrchid’s eyes dart at me around RedBrick’s shoulder, but her shocked eyes seemed burned into my brain. 

_Papa!_

I promised her, <It’s all right. Just let RedBrick take care of you for a little while. Everything is going to be all right.>

The shock on her face when I screamed at her seemed burned into my brain. But she nodded, and sniffed heavily, and burst into tears at the same time. 

My heart, my blood, my bones themselves _screamed_ at me to leap at her, to reassure her, to hold her. I wanted to tell her no-one in the world will ever hurt her while I am there to protect her, I wanted to scream at her how much I love her. 

Instead I withheld a shudder, and turned around slowly. 

I met StripeSide’s eyes. She, and GoldenCycad, and MoonRain were all standing frozen into position, all looking at me with identical expressions of horror in their bloodheat. Looking at the liquid and the chips of glass on my face, dripping slowly to the floor. I saw WingWatch too twist her head around to the floor, and then stare at me. 

I saw the change in her bloodheat when she realized what I had just done. She took a small step backwards, away from me. 

“Is that what I think it is?” StripeSide asked, pointing to me. 

“I need to get into quarantine,” I said, restraining the desperate urge to claw at my face with my talons. “Right now and immediately!”

“He hit you full in the face with _all_ of it.” StripeSide said. “All six eggs worth!” 

The horror was making my neck snake from side to side. 

“I must get to quarantine! Right now! InGen must have a bio-safety lab, they must!”

“Yes,” StripeSide said. She spun around and started giving orders. <RedBrick! Get on the radio! Tell InGen we have a wounded dinosaur who needs to get into quarantine, immediately! Tell Doctor Shade to prepare! Come! We go, now!>


	7. Chapter 7

Oh, how fast the mighty fall! 

When I began this night, I knew it would be a night like no other, but I never foresaw this! 

Oh, hubris! 

The isolation room had glass windows, and white walls, and white floors. It was bright, and white, and airy – but it was a prison. A prison made of glass – a prison I had walked into _freely_ – but still a prison.

The human furniture had already been moved out. Only a mattress remained on the floor for me to sleep in comfort, and a single-screen-toy to keep my mind busy. That was all. 

This was my new home for the next seven days, until either I got sick, or the incubation period of the Influence ran out. It was a really _small_ glass box. 

“Hold still, please.” Doctor Shade spoke through the Translator. 

“I apologise.” I had shuddered in spite of myself. 

I lay on my side. 

Doctor Shade and his assistant were busy around my head and neck. They were gloved and masked and swathed in plastic, protecting themselves from me. I tried not to move, as the fragments of glass were taken out of my face, one by one. The assistant had swabs to mop my blood up, which wasn’t necessary since I could just squeeze each set of blood vessels closed. 

Doctor Shade’s tweezers in my hide were starting to burn as if they were red-hot. 

I spoke to the Translator without moving my head. “If I die, Doctor Shade, then you can use my blood to build a vaccine?”

“Yes,” he said. His eyes met mine, through the shiny plastic of his visor. “But even more if you live. The defenses in your blood will recognise the virus again, and from that we can build a vaccine. We need you to live, ScarBreast.”

“I have fought this thing before. I can fight it again.”

Missing Three-Seven-Two would not have his victory. I knew what I had to do. I would have to stay here, restricting the urge to flee back to the forest. I would have to stay here, and let whatever happened, happened. That was the only way to protect the rest of the Pack. 

“You are very brave,” StripeSide said. 

I rolled my eyes toward her without moving my head. 

My prison had one wall, made entirely of glass. This side was mine, to share with my new microbial best friend.

StripeSide was on the other side of the glass, watching. WingWatch and FirstHuman was there too, and SingsAlone, and a group of BloodWeavers and Capturers. 

“I don’t feel brave,” I said. “But what else can I do, right now? Even if I did run away, I would only take the Influence with me.”

“You are _very_ brave,” she insisted. 

“Last one!” Dr Shade said.

The steel dug at my face one more time. One more twist. I squeezed my blood vessels closed to stop the bleeding, and the assistant dabbed at the blood that had seeped out. 

“That’s it,” Dr Shade said. “All done.” 

“Thank you, Doctor,” I said, glad to have the nasty business finished. They collected their steel tools, and left through the door. They would have to pass through an airlock, and strip off their rubber suit, and shower thoroughly. 

I heard human voices on the other side of the glass, and RedBrick walked in with the Blue Alpha. FirstHuman turned to greet them. 

<The children?> I asked, surging up to my feet. The bloody swabs dropped off my face. I stepped off the mattress, swinging my tail, and stepped to the glass.

<They’re safe,> RedBrick signed to me through the glass. <LittleOrchid is with Sister. The others are with GoodButStrong.>

Relief flooded through me. My child was home again. My child would be safe, no matter what happened to me. 

“She is brave, your small child,” StripeSide said, letting the Translator work for her. 

“Really?”

“She told the other children her father would come. And she was right.”

“We made half a dozen arrests,” the Blue Alpha said. “And we have put news to the world’s Capturers about them. Humans First are going to be listed as a known terror group.”

“Missing Three-Seven-Two have been planning this for a long time. Forensics found a whole manifesto.”

“They would have pulled it off, if not for MarkOfGold,” I said.

“They were watching your movements for weeks,” RedBrick said. “They knew StripeSide would come here to talk to InGen about the Egg Question this month. They knew this would be their best chance of getting at her, and you, at the same time.”

“Clever,” I said. “They knew as well as we do that you don’t hunt by chasing – you hunt by waiting.”

“Not clever enough,” StripeSide said. 

“This will not be the last time,” I said to StripeSide. “Hear me now! The Influence would not be the threat that it is, if we were not all related!”

She cough-barked back. “Now is _not_ the time for discussions of the Egg Question.

“This threat will remain hanging over, unless the Egg Question can be solved by science. It will happen again. The Influence popped up on its own once.” 

She stamped her feet, and hiss-snapped. “What matters now is that it has been contained here. I must inform the rest of the Pack that this thing has happened. Already rumours are spreading through the Pack.” 

“You should rest,” FirstHuman said to me. 

“Agreed,” I said. “I am quite tired. I would like to sleep – the sun is well up, and my bones grow heavy.”

“Then sleep, dear friend.” StripeSide snapped her teeth.

<We will be back tonight to see how you fare,> FirstHuman signed. 

I watched them leave. 

When I was alone, I let my head and tail lower. I was not as brave as I was pretending to be, and the injuries were starting to hurt. 

Only RedBrick remained, staring at me through the glass. 

<You stay?> I signed. 

<There are un-answered questions in this case,> he signed. He reached out and turned off the Translator. 

<Such as?> I asked. 

<We still do not know who killed the Alleyway Victim.>

<Truth, this. But more will be uncovered in the days to come. His connection may become apparent.>

RedBrick didn’t reply. He pulled up a chair by the back, and carried it to the corner of the room. 

There was a camera in the corner of the walls, recording perhaps my last days. I had consented to it. RedBrick climbed onto the chair. He turned the camera so that the glass eye faced the ceiling. 

<There,> he signed. <Now we are alone.>

<Indeed we are,> I signed, watching him. 

RedBrick came back to stand facing me through the glass. 

<I do not think we will find a connection between Alleyway Victim and Humans First. I do not think he is connected with the rest of the case at all.>

I watched him.

<Is he?> RedBrick prompted. 

<How should I know?>

<He _was_ killed by a dinosaur,> RedBrick signed. 

<Yes, this is true,> I agreed.

<He was killed by a dinosaur. That we know. And no dinosaur will be working with Humans First! Therefore, the Alleyway Victim is not connected with that case.>

<Some cases are never solved,> I signed. 

<But whoever killed him left no evidence, no clues. No dinosaur was seen there that night. Whoever killed him knew _exactly_ what he was doing.>

<It was a very neat crime.>

<And there are so many dinosaurs in the City right now. Even more than usual, with StripeSide being here. It could have been anyone. You agree?>

<I agree.>

<And on top of that, it is impossible to find who did it, without DNA evidence. And you’re all so closely related that using DNA evidence at all is almost impossible in any case.>

<This is true,> I said. 

<Which leads me to one conclusion,> RedBrick said. 

<Which is?>

 _< You_ killed him.>

I hissed at him, shocked. 

RedBrick slammed his hand on the table. His teeth were bared in a grimace of anger. <You killed him!>

I hissed back at him, shocked and angry. <Nonsense!>

But RedBrick was not intimidated. 

<You deliberately contaminated the crime scene with your own dander. A stupid beginner mistake, and one that an experience Capturer like you would _never_ make! I wondered at it at the time – but it was not a mistake at all! Was it? You deliberately contaminated your own crime scene to hide the fact that your DNA was the only DNA there!>

I snarled at him. <You’re mad,> I signed. 

<No,> RedBrick signed. <You said it yourself, just morning. You said _, forget the Alleyway Victim, he is irrelevant._ >

I _had_ said that. I blinked my eyes. I had definitely said that. I had been highly emotional at the time, and the words had slipped out. 

<I saw how frantic you were when LittleOrchid went missing! You would have ripped up the whole City to look for her! But _that one clue_ was a waste of time. You _knew_ that clue was a dead end. You _knew_ that the Alleyway Victim would not lead us to LittleOrchid. You knew that, because you killed him.>

I could say nothing to that. 

<And when we got sent to InGen by the Blue Alpha – what was your first question? _Is it a murder? >_

<An innocent question!>

<But why would you ask that? We don’t usually work with murders! Why would the Blue Alpha have passed a murder case to us, unless it was a dinosaur-related murder? And how would you know a dinosaur-related murder had been committed? The body had not even been found yet! The only person who would have known at that time that a murder had been committed was the murderer himself.>

I listened. 

<But of course – as a dinosaur, all dinosaur related cases fall to you. You knew you would be solving your own case! The Capturers would never solve this case. _You_ are the only dinosaur we will never suspect! _You_ are the murderer that your own pack is trying to catch!>

<Have you finished?> I asked.

<Nearly finished!> RedBrick said. <You waited in the dark for the Alleyway Victim to come to you. You punched a hole in his throat, so that he could not scream. And then you kicked him. You made sure he would die.>

<The Uniforms checked the traffic cameras, looking for dinosaurs crossing the bridges. They found nothing.>

<Yes. But you already know where all the traffic cameras are. And you didn’t need to cross a bridge at all. You’re a strong swimmer. You swam the river, which both hid you from all the traffic cameras, and washed all the blood off. Then you stopped off at home so that you had an alibi, and then you came to work, ready and able to start investigating your own crime.>

<You cannot prove anything…> I found myself saying what so many criminals say, in interrogations. I stopped myself. 

<You killed him!> RedBrick signed. <All the things Humans First say about your people, you proved them all right! You _are_ a predator!>

<Nonsense!> I snarled, insulted. 

<You ripped out a man’s guts and left him to die! You’re a Capturer, and a murderer!>

<What I did was justice!> I snapped, angry suddenly. 

_< Justice!_ You pulled out his guts! You ripped him apart like road-kill!>

<In my place you would have done the same!>

<Don’t insult me!> RedBrick snapped. 

<You would have done the same! He deserved exactly what he got!>

<He _deserved_ having his guts ripped out?> RedBrick signed, and he laughed at me; a bitter incredulous laugh. 

<He deserved every second of it!> I hissed so hard that my spit misted on the glass.

<Why? _Why_ did you do this thing?>

<Because _he_ sired LittleOrchid!>

His hands froze in the air. He stared at me, with his mouth open. 

I leaped to the glass, and screamed at him again, so that my breath vapoured on the glass. 

<Yes, you read that sign! He sired LittleOrchid, by force! On my bond-mate!>

<You told me she was…> His hands stopped in mid-air. 

<He waited for DelightsInOrchids in a dark place, and he mated with her by force, and he fathered LittleOrchid!>

<How do you know?>

<I told you, I never forget a scent!. He left his seed and his sweat all over her. She wept with her arms around my neck, and I smelled his stink on her. Now, tell me you would not have done the same in my place!>

<But how … when…>

<I smelled him again two weeks ago in the street.>

<You could have told someone!>

I turned away from the glass, dismissing the idea. <And then what would happen? DelightsInOrchids cannot bear witness from the grave. It would be my word against his. Hearsay evidence! And smells do not stand up in court! Smell is not evidence in a human legal system! Remember that?>

RedBrick rocked back on his heels, putting two and two together in his mind. He reached out for the chair, and leaned on the back of it as if he was dizzy. 

<I swore to DelightsInOrchids that he would not get away with it. So I waited. I knew that predators do not hunt only once. I knew that _one_ day, he would be waiting in another dark alley, for another victim. And I knew that I would know his stink again. So I waited. It has taken me all these years, but I knew I would find him.>

<So you killed him.>

<I had the Disposables watch him, waiting for him to leave his home and move to another dark alley. When they saw him staking out the back of a drinking place, they summoned me. This time, when he waited in the dark, I was there.>

I remember the way he jumped when I leaned out of the darkness behind him and exhaled on his neck. I remember the feeling of my killing-claws sinking into his flesh, the way he clawed at the cement, the glitter of his eyes as he stared up at me, choking on the blood in his throat. I watched him die, and I was _glad._

The only thing I wanted was a way to tell him whose rape he was dying _for._

<I failed to protect my bond-mate,> I signed. <But I did avenge her.>

I raised my killing-claws, and tapped them against the tiled floor. I have the weapons of a predator. Last night I _used_ them. Humans are so delicate, so fragile – even the predators among them are as delicate as hatchlings. 

_JesusChrist…_ RedBrick said aloud. He lowered his head into his hands. For a long moment, he sat pressing his knuckles into his forehead. 

I watched him, waiting. My breath ghosted on the cold glass between us. I made no sounds. I merely waited. 

<Is that why you joined the Capturers?> he asked at last. <Is that _all_ your duty is, to you? A chance for vengeance?>

<Not _all! >_ I signed. <I became a Capturer as a way to raise LittleOrchid. I knew that I could hunt at the same time.>

<You murdered a human in cold blood! You broke StripeSide's law, as well as ours!>

<What would you have done in my place?> I asked him. <You have daughters. What would _you_ do, if you knew there was a predator around your daughters that no-one else knew? What would you have done?>

<I certainly would not have ripped out his guts!> RedBrick recoiled. 

<There was no other way to stop him. He was just too careful. How many women did he hurt, in the end? I do not know. Perhaps you can find out, RedBrick? But I know he will never hurt anyone else, and that is what matters. He would not have stopped. Even now, we have no record of his crimes, tying him to them. I have _no_ regrets.>

RedBrick sat down. He looked at me for a long time with a strange expression on his face. I looked back at him.

<You’ve put me in an impossible situation!> he signed. 

<If it means anything, I did not expect to get caught,> I signed. 

<Withhold the truth, and I become an accomplice. I will be no better than the Capturers in the days of the White Powder Kings! But tell the truth, and I ruin LittleOrchid’s childhood!>

<You may have the choice taken from you,> I signed. I twisted my head to look around the glass prison. <I may yet die in here.>

<Nobody dies from the Influence!>

<We do!> I signed. <I nearly died from it the first time!>

RedBrick stood up and straightened his spine. <Here is what you will do.>

<Will do?>

<You are going to write down everything.>

<Write?> I turned my head, and looked at the screen-toy. 

< A full confession. Everything that happened, since last night! If you die in here, I will keep it safe for LittleOrchid, when she is old enough to know. Nobody else will know. This case will be one more unsolved cold case!>

<And if I live?>

<And if you live… you leave the Capturers. Quietly. This is your last case, ScarBreast. And it would not be wise to attempt to silence me. Do you understand?>

<I understand. And I am grateful.>

He recoiled. <I am not doing it for you! I am doing this for a little girl who does not deserve to see her Papa sent to prison for murder!>

There did not seem anything I could say to that. 

I knew that whether I survived my glass prison or not, this moment was goodbye. I was saying goodbye to the pack-mate I had worked with, and the friendship I had known. RedBrick would not trust me again. He had seen what one of my species can do to one of his species. He knew that I had lied, and schemed, and killed – and worse, he knew I had _enjoyed it._

My time with the Capturers was over. 

RedBrick looked at me. He raised his hands, as if to sign again, but there was a movement at the door. 

He snapped around, and I did too. Two guilty creatures, surprised. 

LittleOrchid burst into the room. She ran to the window, and immediately burst into tears. 

<Don’t die, Papa!>

<I have no intention of dying! This is a precaution, that is all. Doctor Shade is a very good doctor and he will look after me.>

She pressed her hands on the glass. I pressed my nose against the glass, and breathed out. My breath steamed on the glass around her fingers. If I could have smelled her through the glass, I would have. But I could not. I had to stay here in this glass, for her sake – for all their sakes!

<Did they hurt you?> I asked her. 

<No,> she said fiercely, sniffing hard. <I hurt them! I kicked them and bit them!>

<They wanted to hurt me, by hurting you. Do you understand? That is why I must stay here, to make sure I cannot pass the poison to you, or anyone else?>

RedBrick slipped away. I watched him leave, but he did not speak to Sister. He was gone. I wondered if I would ever see him again.

Sister stayed by the door. Her crossed arms said, _“You’re still an idiot,”_ but that was not news.

<How long do you have to stay here?> LittleOrchid asked. 

<Only a week!> I said. <And then we will go to the park, and you will have your ice-cream.>

<Good!> She wiped her eyes with her fists. 

<And then it is time that I should tell you something about your father.>

<My _human_ father?> Her eyes went wide. 

<I met him once. Very briefly, just before he died.>

<He died?>

<He never got to know you. That is my gain, and his loss. But you have his eyes, and his colouring, and his hair.>

<I knew it!> She put her hands up to her hair. 

If I do get out of here, I will have to come up with some more lies. 

But if I don’t get out of here, she will at least have half of the truth. Half of the truth will be better than nothing. And I know that RedBrick will not tell her the other half until she is much older. RedBrick is a good man. I can trust him to do the right thing. 

I leaned my head forward, pressing the end of my snout against the glass. She reached out her hand, and pressed it onto the glass on her side. I exhaled against the glass. 

<Did I ever tell you about the time I fell down a well? 

An eye-roll. _Papaaaaa!_

I suppose that means I _have_ told her. 

<I have a job to do, little one,> I signed. <I must dig down the hole, so that no-one else falls in. Do you understand?>

She nodded. She was afraid, but she’s tough. Tiny and tough; a real fighter. She really is a dinosaur’s daughter! She will be all right, no matter what happens to me. 

I imagined my breath curling warmly around her little hand. I could not smell her, but I imagined her smell. 

<You must be a brave girl now, and listen to your aunt, and then I will come home very soon.>

<You promise, Papa!>

<I promise!> I lied. <Don’t worry about me! I am big and strong!>

I waited until she was out of the room, and then knocked my talon on the glass so that Sister turned at the last moment.

<If I fall ill, don’t bring her back here.>

Sister nodded crisply. <Don’t you _dare_ die on that child, lizard!>

<I will do my best.>

* * *

Five a.m. 

I am very tired, but I have finished my task. My arm aches from writing.

I told you right from the first: there are many things that I will omit from my story! I spelled it out from the start: "Everything in my story is true, but many things are missing." All I did was start my story from soon after I killed him! 

I paid off the Disposables to damage just the right sequence of traffic cameras, so that I was not recorded going away from the scene. As soon as I was sure that the man was dying, I left him, and followed my selected route to the river. I jumped in and swam for the opposite bank, letting the water wash the blood off me, and then continued running until I reached home. 

LittleOrchid and SisterOfOrchids were my alibi, if I needed them. They could testify that they had seen me at around the same time that my victim was dying. And then later, I made sure that I left enough dander behind on the corpse to thoroughly confuse the DNA evidence. As I said at the time, I did what little had to be done.

StripeSide smelled blood on me immediately, of course. She is sharp, that one! Luckily I already had a valid reason for smelling of blood.

And it _was_ a mistake to mention murder to the Blue Alpha immediately, but I was on my nerves, waiting for the news to break that the body had been discovered. 

I had it all planned! And I would have got away with it, too, if it was not for Missing Three-Seven-Two, and his stolen eggs. Odd, how it all panned out.

Now I am alone, facing my conscience and my fate in a small glass prison. 

And yet I have no pity for myself. I have many regrets, but I would change very few things about my life. On the whole, I believe that I have left this world better for having lived in it.

I waited eleven years to give vengeance to my poor darling DelightsInOrchids, the bond-mate I failed to protect. Now I have done what I set out to do. My conscience is clear.

When I am finished, I will leave the screen-toy with Doctor Shade, and he will give it to RedBrick. I can trust him to arrange it all. 

I have only one request, dear reader. If I do die in here, add a few lines to this story, and say so? A few lines at the bottom will be enough. 

If you read this document, dear reader, and there is no little epilogue, you may know that I live. 

I will save this document and close the screen-toy now. I am quite tired. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I legit have no idea if I have managed to pull this off! 
> 
> I borrowed the trope of the narrator investigating his own crime from Agatha Christie's 'The Murder of Roger Ackroyd' - one of the best detective stories ever written. I pulled a few names, and a few verbatim quotes from it.


End file.
